Black Hole Philosophy
by StarvingLunatic
Summary: An AU of my Pariahverse. Pretty much, the pairings have been reversed and Shin has a girlfriend. By the end of it, things should be in their proper order. Can it be done?
1. Fancy meeting you here

Black hole Philosophy

A/N: okay, the main idea behind this story is that it's an AU of the Pariah-verse. Everything starts out almost the opposite of how it is in Pariah. It's also dedicated to Chibi Izzum/ Voyeurism.

1: Fancy meeting you here

Trin sighed, hating that she decided to go to the bank now. Still, she and her evil twin needed money for books and she certainly could not relay on him for such an important task. Shin would have made it to the bank and got the money, but by the time he got to the book store, he would be penniless and that was if he made it to the book store. There was always the chance that he would get so distracted that he might never make it to the whole reason he was going to the bank for in the first place. Just thinking about it made Trin sigh again.

She had class in a half-hour, so she would really appreciate the line that she was standing in moving sometime that century. Looking at her, one would not think that Trin had class, but then again, one probably would not know what to think she had looking at her. She was wearing a blush pink suit with a golden vest and canary yellow tie. She had matching pink low-cut boots. Shin had called the outfit "disturbing and disgusting" when he saw her leave the apartment that morning; he was throwing her words back at her from when she described most of his outfits.

Trin checked her watch, just to see how long the line had been at a standstill. It felt like an eternity, but it was not even two minutes. But, two minutes was still way too long for a line to not move. She could not believe that so many people were in the bank on a weekday morning either. She had thought that she was being slick by coming in mid-morning on a weekday when everyone should be at work, but it would seem that she was wrong.

And then, suddenly, something even more annoying happened. A hole was blown in the ceiling from the roof and a woman entered the bank threw the new portal. The woman had a flowing ebony mane and pale green skin. She smirked as she landed and a flame charged out of her hand like fire on a candle. She displayed the power proudly and from the outfit that she was wearing, Trin could guess what was going to happen.

"No way," the blonde college student muttered. Her luck could not possibly be that bad, she told herself.

"Okay, nobody move and I won't have to fry anybody. Just fill this bag with money quickly and everybody can be on their way," the super-powered female announced while throwing duffle bag at the teller behind her.

Shego could not believe what she had been talked into doing by Drakken. Come on, bank-robbing? How goddamn cliché was that? But, he required fast money for his latest problems, namely paying his henchmen. She would not have cared, if only she was not included in that lump of people that lacked a paycheck. She figured that she was going to have to start giving Drakken an allowance if he was going to blow check money on his nutty schemes.

Trin watched as a teller started loading money into the bag. Oh, hell, no, she thought. There was no way that she was going to be held up and probably have to go to another branch of the bank after such a mess. She also did not want to have to go through all of the questions from police that would come after a bank robbery. So, it was decided then as far as she was concerned. She stepped out of the line.

"Hey, I said don't move," Shego ordered.

"Yeah, I have a listening problem," the college student remarked.

The blonde, borderline nerdy-looking female surprised Shego by leaping at her. The villainess gasped as she dodged a very precise punch. A millisecond late on that move and Shego would have had a broken nose. The green-skinned woman would have been incredulous to what just happened, if only she had the time.

Shego had to put her forearms up to block a kick coming at her from the blonde girl. Trin snorted slightly because she could not land a blow. She lost the element of surprise by then and she knew that. She put her hands up as a counterattack came, which she was pleased did not include those green flames. She ducked as claw assault came her way and she took Shego's legs out from under her.

The emerald-eyed thief grunted as she hit the deck. She rolled out of the way as Trin tried to come down on her with her fists. She flipped up to her feet and then flung a plasma sphere at Trin, which the blonde barely dodged; she did lose some strands of golden hairs to the shot, though. As she avoided the blast, Shego met her at the space that she dodged to. Trin threw her hands up to block the next assault.

The blonde college student found herself being defensive as Shego came at her stronger than before, so she knew her element of surprise was totally over. So, she dipped and dodged as best she could, waiting for the perfect area to attack. She saw an opening and went for it, punching Shego in the right side of the ribs. Shego coughed when the blow landed, more stunned than pained, but now Trin was coming at her.

Trin continued with fist attacks, which Shego was trying to dodge or block. And then the sound of sirens going off distracted the green-skinned villainess. Shego cursed under her breath and then flipped away from Trin as quickly as possible. She returned to the hole that she had blown into the ceiling.

"We'll do this again, geek bait," Shego said to the blonde before disappearing.

Trin sucked her teeth in frustration, having gotten going in the fight and wishing for it to continue. She turned her eyes away from the hole and fixed her clothing. She then turned her attention to a teller, noticing that she was standing right in front of the window. She slid her withdrawal slip to the woman, who was in complete and utter shock as to what just happened between the customer and the would-be bank robber.

"Yes, so if you could just give me my five hundred dollars, I'll be on my way," Trin stated as if nothing happened. As the teller went to get the money for her, the police burst into the bank, hollering "freeze!" to no one in particular.

-------------------

Tatsu was out of her element. She had come to one of those new coffee shops that opened up on a side of town that she hardly visited. To be honest, she rarely left her shabby garage, except for "food" shopping and to see races on occasion to see her work in action. Food shopping for her consisted buying anything that she only needed to add water to or could stick in a microwave. Other than that, she did not typically venture outside amongst the throngs of people, hating crowds.

She was going to the coffee shop because of the few female race-car drivers that she knew swore to the high heavens that she needed to try the place. She was not a big coffee drinker, but she did not have anything better to do with her time. So, she went to broaden her horizons; things like she was doing now were as far as she would ever go in doing something like "broadening her horizons." Her boyfriend was always trying to tell her that she needed to try new things anyway. But, what did he know, she remarked to herself.

She brought a cup, believing that the coffee was damned expensive and she probably never would go to the shop again. As she was leaving the place, two teens entered, speaking to each other. The pair did not seem to be paying attention and that would explain why the girl amongst the two ran right into Tatsu.

"Ah, damn," the ebony-haired mechanic muttered to herself because the cup in her hand was knocked against her chest and she was covered in her drink.

"Oh, my god! I'm so sorry!" Kim screeched as she realized that she had just caused the person she ran into to spill her coffee on herself. From the volume that Kim screamed at, it was clear that she thought that it was scolding hot coffee too.

"It's okay," Tatsu muttered, looking down at her now filthy dark blue jumpsuit.

"Are you okay?" Kim pled to know.

"Fine. It was cold," the mechanic answered. She had gotten an iced coffee because she did not feel like waiting for the drink to cool off.

Kim breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that she had not horrible burned someone. But, she now felt guilty. She had caused the woman to spill her coffee, after all. Not just spill it, but get it all over herself too.

"Let me buy you a new one," Kim offered with a bright smile. Ron was busy being scared out of his wits because he realized just who his best friend had spilled the beverage on.

"That's all right," Tatsu replied in her typical mumble speech.

"No, no, no! Let me," Kim insisted.

"No thanks," the blue-eyed mechanic stated and she started toward the door, which was a few feet away.

"Please, let me!" the redheaded hero implored her and she grabbed Tatsu by the arm.

Ron gulped as Tatsu turned around slightly, looking at Kim from the corner of her eyes. The look that she gave his best friend was borderline artic in temperature. Kim seemed unfazed by the expression in the ice blue eyes.

"K.P, maybe you should let it go," Ron suggested.

"No, no, no. I made a mistake and I'd like to make up for it," the adventurer explained.

"It's all right. I didn't want it anyway," Tatsu said while pulling her limb back to her.

Kim seemed rather dejected by that and Tatsu took the brief moment of inaction to walk out of the place. Kim sucked her teeth because she had really desired to make up for her clumsiness. Ron breathed a sigh of relief.

"Wow, Kim, that was close," the blonde boy commented.

"What was close?" Kim asked curiously.

"That. Don't you know who that was?" he inquired.

"No. Who was that?"

"What the? That was Tatsu," he informed her, but Kim's blank expression let him know that she still had no clue what he was talking about. "Tatsu, the serpent. You know," he said.

"No, I don't know. So, are you going to tell me?" Kim inquired.

"Oh, come on! She's like a gangster or something. She's involved in those street races that you hear so much about. I hear she even kills people," Ron answered.

Kim looked skeptical. "Where do you hear these things?" she asked him. He always knew the most bizarre things, in her opinion anyway.

"Around," he answered with a shrug. Sometimes, he did not even know where he got his information from. Kim smiled at him and shook her head in an amused way. She silently commented to herself that Tatsu was pretty soft-spoken and understanding for a gangster.

----(New day)

Trin rubbed her eyes as she exited her night class. That bastard Shin had left early without telling her why, but she suspected that it had something to do with him wanting a new video game that came out. She did not see why he did not ditch their morning or afternoon classes, but then again, she did not understand why he felt it necessary to play video games either. She liked to think that at nineteen they had both grown up some, but she was pretty sure that everyone that knew them would disagree.

It was dark by the time she got out of classes, but that did not bother her. The campus looked deserted, even with the street lights on. She started the walk to her car and then stopped along the way as she caught sight of a familiar figure standing under a street light.

"I hope you didn't come all this way for your ass-kicking to continue," Trin commented. It was Shego that was standing underneath the light, looking rather smug in the blonde's opinion.

"I came all this way to continue your ass-kicking," Shego replied. There was no way in hell that she was going to let some prissy-looking bimbo get the better of her in a fight.

"You don't want to fight me," Trin stated. She now supposed that it was good thing that the cops came when they did and chased the robber off. She could end up in a lot of trouble beating the thief the way that she typically did to those that antagonized her and her little sister was not around to stop her.

"No, I think I do. So, put the bag down and let's get to it."

"You don't want to do this."

"What, you scared?" Shego inquired.

The blonde dropped her shoulder bag to the floor and put her hands up. She knew that she should not do it, but ever since that fight at the bank, she had desired to face the thief again. She was no fool. She knew who the woman was and that just made her want to battle with Shego even more.

The green-skinned woman smirked. She did not know as much about her opponent as Trin knew about her. She just knew that a blonde student named Trin Possible had embarrassed her in a bank and delayed her paycheck because of that. She knew that she wanted revenge and she was certain that she was going to get just what she wanted.

The pair both got into their fighting stances, obviously not caring as to the fact that they were about to battle on a university campus. All they wanted to do was go at each other again and so they did. They fought even harder than when they were at the bank because they both knew what the other was capable.

Trin frowned while fighting with Shego. At the bank, it had not registered to her who she was dealing with, but now, she knew. She was fighting with a woman that tormented her little sister almost on a weekly basis. The thought of someone hurting her little sister over and over again bothered her, of course. It bothered her a lot.

The blonde hated seeing people mess with her little sister. Back when they were younger, people used to pick on her sister just for being her sister. People used to torture her sibling just for being related to Trin. Kids used to try to beat her sister up and having endured more than enough beatings in her childhood, she never wanted her sister to go through the same, so she used to wail on people who touched her sister in harmful manner. She had plans to do that to Shego too.

The green-skinned female was shocked by the power that Trin was coming at her with. She did not think that a girl that looked like Trin, like some glamour girl, should be coming at her as she was. It did not matter, though. She met Trin's force with her own while noting something odd about the blonde's style. Trin reminded her of Kim, but more like a demon version of Kim.

The way that Trin moved was similar to Kim, Shego thought. Even the combinations that she went with seemed like that little goody-goody, Shego noted. Since she knew that Trin's last name was also Possible, she wondered if there was an relation, even though she could imagine someone that fought like a devil being related to an angel like Kim.

The pair danced with each other like two fire-breathing dragons, complete with fire on Shego's end. They landed blows that would have knocked out weaker beings easily and yet they kept coming. They were both in disbelief as the fight progressed and neither of them fell to the other quickly, or even slowly. They both fought until they could not fight anymore.

"Amazing," they both thought while backing away from each other, never taking their eyes off of the other until they were out of sight.

----(New day)

Kim was walking with a pile of books in her hands. She was trying to keep a good hold on them. She had taken them out of the library because she had a huge project that was due and she knew that she needed to get to it while she had the time. She turned a corner and felt herself run into something that she could not see. The something grunted on impact and the sound of things falling, which were her books and something else.

"Sorry," Kim said before she got a good look at who she had hit and then she looked up. "You again," she muttered as she noticed that she had bumped into Tatsu again.

"It's all right," Tatsu muttered as she looked down at what was going to be her dinner. She had gone out for fast food and brought pizza. The pizza was on the concrete, as was the soda that she had been drinking. "Sorry about your books," she added when she saw that some of the books had landed in her spilled drink.

"It's cool," Kim answered as she leaned down and started to pick her books up.

Tatsu bent down to help, even though she did consider just walking away. It was not her fault that the redheaded teen was clumsy, she told herself. But, she did not listen to that voice in her head and she picked up half of the books, holding on to them while Kim had the other books.

"Thanks," Kim said and she waited for Tatsu to pile the other books on her stack.

"Where you going?" the mechanic inquired.

"Huh?"

"I'll carry these," Tatsu stated and she thought that might seem weird, so she guessed that she should explain why. "So, you don't hit anyone else."

"Oh. Okay, thanks," Kim replied with a broad smile. If Tatsu was a gangster then she was just about the sweetest thug that Kim had ever met. "But, if you help me, you have to let me make up for dropping your stuff again."

Tatsu sighed, but she agreed to that. She hoped that Kim making things up to her did not involve anything over the top. They started walking and that was when Kim thought to introduce herself.

"I'm Kim," the younger female said.

"Tatsu," the mechanic sort of grunted out.

Kim nodded for lack of a better thing to do. They walked to her house, which was a few minutes away. After that, Kim suggested that they go to the pizza shop and she would buy Tatsu a makeup slice for her mistake earlier. Tatsu accepted because she really wanted a slice of pizza.

They did not really talk through out the walk, but Kim did keep looking at Tatsu rather curiously. It was not something that Tatsu was unfamiliar with, but she could tell that it was not the same kind of staring of many people that did not know her. Kim was not wary of her or anything. It was kind of nice, she thought and then she shook that notion away.

"Thanks," Tatsu commented once the pizza was purchased.

"No problem. It's the least I could do," Kim replied with another smile.

"Take care," Tatsu said as a farewell.

"Okay. I hope I see run into you again…well, not literally again," the redhead said with a sheepish smile on her face.

Tatsu shrugged as a response. Maybe they would run into each other again. She did not think that she would mind that. Kim seemed like a nice girl and she would not mind being around her for a few minutes, which was more time than she was willing to spend with most people. Hell, she even hated being around her boyfriend after a few minutes.

-------------------

Next time: Kim and Tatsu become friends while Shin and Trin talk about relationships. Shego and Trin also build up a routine.


	2. Getting in the door

I don't own these characters, except for Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. The others belong to Disney.

2: Getting in the door

Kim had run into Tatsu quite a few times after those first couple of incidents. It was odd in both of their opinions. They had lived in Middleton all of their lives and had not seen each other in the sixteen years that Kim had been alive, but suddenly in a few weeks they had crossed paths over a dozen times. Kim joked that it had to be fate; Tatsu only shrugged while trying to get away.

The redhead had taken it upon herself to be Tatsu's friend when she noticed that no one was ever with the mechanic. Tatsu did not put up any active resistance, but she did not change the way she acted, which usually scared people away, but not Kim. The teen hero stayed around Tatsu and eventually the mechanic just accepted her presence, but she still did not change her demeanor.

Kim usually hung around Tatsu when Ron was "busy." He considered playing video games busy while Kim considered it a waste of time. She did that because Ron was uncomfortable around Tatsu and that was rather clear. He said that something about the blue-eyed female was just creepy; he thought it had something to do with her eyes actually. He had never seen such ice blue eyes and he thought that when she looked at him, she was staring into his soul. It just chilled him to the core of his being; he was not alone in that, which was another feature of Tatsu's that kept people away from her.

It was actually a good thing that Kim hung around Tatsu without Ron. Having two people around her would have bothered Tatsu to the point where she would have made a serious effort to get them away from her after a few minutes. She just was not that social, which Kim noticed.

"So, what do you say we go to a movie?" Kim suggested while walking with Tatsu. She ran into the mechanic at a corner store and helped Tatsu buy some healthier food than the older teen usually would.

"Now?" Tatsu inquired with a slightly puzzled expression on her face.

"Yeah, now. I'm free. Do you have anything you need to do?"

Tatsu thought about it. She had cars waiting, but she could always get to them later on. Did she really want to go to the movies? She supposed that it would be all right. She had gone a couple of times to the movies with her boyfriend on the few occasions that he actually came back to town to spend time with her. If she could go out with him and not slay him, then she figured that she could easily stand being with Kim for a while.

"I'm good. We can go," Tatsu answered.

"That's great. There's a new movie out that I've been dying to see," Kim stated. She knew better than to try to drag Ron to the movie and Monique had been busy for the past week.

The mechanic did not argue with Kim. She figured that it would be more energy than she was willing to part with to ever argue with Kim since the girl seemed so strong-willed and determined to be her friend. Besides, she had quietly noted a while ago that being around Kim was not totally unpleasant, although she was still getting used to the company.

So, she went to the movies with Kim after bumping off her "groceries" at her garage; potato chips, donuts, and a bag of baby carrots could count as groceries to her. The mechanic brought the tickets. She was not sure why she had not let Kim pay, but she would not have thought about it if Kim had not protested when she pulled out money. Tatsu let the hero object, but she still gave up the money in her pocket when time came to pay for the tickets.

"You didn't have to do that," the redhead pointed out.

"I know," Tatsu answered.

"So, why did you?" Kim asked curiously, almost as if she could not understand why the mechanic had paid for her to get the movie.

Tatsu shrugged; she just felt like paying. Was that a crime? Kim let it go, knowing that if she persisted, it would get on Tatsu's nerves and she might just walk out of the theater. It was a wise move on Kim's part; it seemed like she was learning a lot about Tatsu already, although she did not think that there was much to learn. Tatsu was easy enough to read in Kim's opinion. All she had to do was make sure not to push anything too much and remain friendly while talking to the older female and everything seemed to go well.

The movie was a romantic-comedy. Tatsu did not imagine herself as a romantic or a comedian, so she was not enjoying the movie much until she glanced over at Kim. She saw that Kim found the movie entertaining, laughing at some points or just looking enthralled in the feature. Kim's reaction seemed to make going to the movie worth it to the mechanic.

Tatsu thought that was weird. Being around someone who was enjoying herself did not usually affect her like it was doing with her for Kim. She supposed that it was her subconscious forcing her to make an effort like the hero was making an effort to be her friend. The redhead was being nice to her and seemed to enjoy being around her and she would like to return that for some reason that was beyond her. She considered that she might understand why if she just continued to be around Kim for a while.

-------------------

Trin was reading by the window in her shared apartment with Shin. The half-Japanese fellow was in the living room, playing a video game for lack of a better thing to do. He had pestered Trin earlier about helping him make the life of a professor a living hell. He did not particular care for the professor, believing the man to be a racist. For once, Trin did not think that he was jumping to conclusions, but she had opted on not helping him at the moment.

Shin had noticed his roommate was acting strangely and had been for nearly a month. Usually, she would have been all for teaching a bigot a lesson or two, but now she seemed distracted. He did not like that because it meant someone other than he was getting her attention. He liked it when she focused on him and typically he did not have to share her unless her siblings were around. He figured that he should voice his theory as to why she seemed so distracted now.

"So, who's your new girlfriend?" Shin inquired without bothering to take his eyes off of his game. He sounded as if it was nothing, as he always tried to make things out to be, even though Trin having someone take up time that should be his was something to him.

"Excuse me?" Trin countered in her usual tone. She did not take her eyes off of her book.

"Who's your new girlfriend?" he repeated. He guessed that she had a girlfriend because in the past, the few girls that she had that could be considered girlfriends did take up her time, even though he thought that her idea of being a girlfriend was weird.

Trin had had a few girlfriends in her life since she hit puberty and was certain that she was a lesbian. She was not the most social being, even though she was pretty, so she did not mingle enough to have a girlfriend constantly. She also had a deep hatred of touching, kissing especially, which made it hard for her to maintain a physical relationship, which did not even include sex. In fact, the idea of sex seemed utterly disgusting to Trin; she could not even watch love scenes in a movie without turning away.

"I don't have a girlfriend," Trin stated soundly, almost as if she was calling her best friend an idiot for even suggesting such a thing.

"What do you mean you don't have a new girlfriend?" he asked. That did not make any sense to him. She had to have a new girlfriend because that was the only way to explain her behavior, especially the fact that she was not helping him get at the racist professor.

"Why are you even worrying about me having a girlfriend? Don't you think you should focus on your girlfriend? I mean, when was the last time you even called her?" Trin retorted.

The ebony-haired young man conceded that point. He had no idea when was the last time he called his girlfriend. She was hard to talk to on the phone anyway. She was the kind of girl that he needed to see if he was going to be in contact with her.

"You're a horrible boyfriend. I don't see why she puts up with you," Trin commented and she meant that.

"Because I'm damn cute," he replied with a confident, arrogant smirk.

"I've seen cuter," she teased him, still focusing on her book and not looking at him.

"Like you even look at guys, you dyke," he countered.

"Ouch," she said dryly. One day he was going to shock her and say something witty, she commented mentally.

"I guess I should call her, though. See what she's up too or something like that," Shin yielded.

Trin rolled her eyes. She did think that he was a very neglectful boyfriend. She did not see why his girlfriend stayed with him, why any girl stayed with him. He picked up girls by being totally confident in himself, but then he did not do anything with them. He hardly paid attention to his girlfriends when they were out and when he took them home, it was out of sight, out of mind with him. He did not even treat them like girlfriends from what she could tell, he treated them like friends.

Shin went and grabbed his mobile phone. "Hey, lover, what you up to?" he asked his girlfriend once she answered the phone.

"Nothing," she answered in a mumble.

"You're never up to anything, Tatsu," he commented. "You miss me?" he inquired in an almost teasing tone, like it was obvious that she missed him because he was, well, him.

Trin rolled her eyes again in the background. She had never met Shin's current girlfriend. All she knew was that he met her at street race back in their hometown. She thought that out of all his girlfriends, Shin treated Tatsu the worst, but she seemed to return the favor. Most of the time, he never wanted to drive out to see her and Tatsu seemed to be of like mind in that because she never came to the apartment or even to their town. He hardly called Tatsu and she almost never called either. Their phone conversations were typically quick, but Trin did not think too much of it.

Shin and Tatsu were still together, so they had to be doing something that worked for them. Things did work for the couple mostly because neither of them really seemed to be trying. Sometimes, Trin considered that they were both too lazy to break up with each other, but other times, she thought that they really got along better than Shin did with any of his girlfriends.

When Shin was with Tatsu, he could get her talking, but it took some effort, which he did not really mind. It had to be about a race that she worked on the cars that were competing. Sometimes, he could get her to talk about cars point blank, which he actually did not know much on, but he could compare her knowledge with other knowledge that he held. He liked that about Tatsu, which was one of the reasons why he would not break up with her, even though to the untrained eye (and trained eye with Trin) their relationship seemed to be stale.

Trin actually thought that the couple seemed more like friends than anything else from what she knew about them. When they were in Middleton and she was hanging out with her sister, Shin took that time to go hang out with Tatsu. He did not seem to take her on what Trin would consider dates, but she guessed that as long as couple was together, where they went was a date.

While Shin was on the phone with Tatsu, talking about an engine that Tatsu was currently working on, Trin thought about what Shin said earlier. He seemed to be under the impression that she had a girlfriend. Usually, when he made guesses like that, he was on the money, but he was way off at the moment, in her high and mighty opinion anyway. The only female that she had spent time around was Shego, who seemed to show up every few nights when she was alone and they would battle.

Shego seemed to be stalking her, but Trin did not mind. She liked when Shego showed up and they could take each other on. The best part was the more that they fought, the less she wondered about her demons coming out and something going terribly wrong. Their fighting now seemed to be more like heavy sparring, which was something that she did with Shin. They were looking to injure each other, but not to the point where the other would unable to function during the next fight. They exchanged banter while fighting, but it was nothing to be considered deep or as if they were girlfriends.

Yes, Shego was an attractive woman and Trin silently admitted that her knowing how to fight only added to it. Trin also was starting to believe that Shego was just as much of a lesbian as she was, but she was not looking for a girlfriend at the moment, not like Shego anyway; or so that was what she told herself. She did not even like Shego.

Shego was annoying to the point where Trin would like to staple her lips together to keep her from opening her mouth. She doubted that they could build a relationship off of something like that. Then there was the fact that Shego seemed to like bodily contact, getting a kick out of pinning Trin when she could and rubbing up against her; such actions helped the blonde conclude that Shego was lesbian. Trin was not comfortable with touching outside of fighting, especially by people that were not her family. She considered that Shego might just do such things to be a pest, quietly noting how tense Trin became when she did brush up against the blonde in a naughty manner.

And then there was the major factor, which was that Shego was her sister's arch-foe. It was far from cute to date her little sister's enemy, she thought. Hell, it was not even good to have whatever the hell they had at the moment. She did threaten to kill Shego if something terrible happened to her little sister. Shego had only laughed at the time; she had been easing up on Kim ever since she met Trin.

----(New day)

Shego was waiting for Trin to come out of a building. As far as she knew, the blonde had to go speak with a professor, which was why she was going to be alone. Shego had actually developed some hatred for the boy that was always around Trin, namely Shin. She wanted Trin to herself so they could do their thing and Shin made that hard by constantly being around Trin. The green-skinned woman, of course, found many opportunities to pounce on the blonde when she was alone, though.

She wanted Trin alone because she was not looking for anyone to interfere with their time together. She liked battling Trin, but not for the sake of fighting. She was looking forward to soundly beating the blonde one day, but mostly she liked taunting and teasing Trin. It was amusing for the simple fact that Trin had comebacks, which were usually missing when she had something to say to other people.

She wondered what was taking Trin so long after a few minutes passed. How long could it take to sort a matter out with a professor? She desired to check on the blonde because she wanted to make sure that nothing was going on. But, as soon as she was willing to go in, Trin exited the building.

"Where the hell have you been, Possible?" Shego inquired while stepping out next to the blonde. She probably would have surprised anyone else by seemingly just appearing by their side, but Trin did not even finch.

"What's it to you?" Trin countered.

"Nothing, except you're screwing around on my time," the green-skinned female stated, as if she was serious.

"When did it become your time?"

"When you became my bitch," Shego remarked. "My name is tattooed on your ass," she added and then she groped the aforementioned area. Oh, that felt very nice, the villainess noted in the back of her mind.

Trin yelped, which was unlike her, but she was very surprised by the move. She swatted at Shego to get the villainess away from her, which worked. Shego had noted not too long ago that grabbing Trin in a personal area truly got to the blonde, so she groped her every now and then to be annoying. Well, Shego did it to be annoying and to touch a hot chick; yeah, she was into girls. She was definitely going to start grabbing that ass more often, she told herself.

"Don't do that," Trin huffed.

"Why not?" Shego asked and she did it again. That ass was just calling her now.

"Ah!" Trin screamed in frustration while moving away. "You keep doing that and I'm going to think that you want to be my friend," she remarked with a taunting half-smirk.

"Like hell I do. Who in their right mind would want to be your friend?" Shego scoffed.

"Who said you were in your right mind? Look at what you do for a living," the younger female riposted.

Shego chuckled a bit. "Such a smartass."

"That's my line."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, let's get to it," the emerald-eyed female stated. They had a good time teasing each other, but now, she wanted to get to the fighting.

"I'd like to, but I have a couple of papers to get to," Trin answered.

"Papers?" Shego groaned. She now hated college because it was cutting into her fun.

"Yeah, I've got English papers."

"What about that guy you're always with? Can't he do them?" Shego inquired.

"Shin is handling the history papers," Trin explained. She hoped that he got to those soon too. He worried her with the way that he did things because he always waited until the last minute while she was more interested in doing things as soon as possible to get them out of the way.

Shego rolled her eyes. "So, how long is this going to take?" she inquired curiously.

"I don't know, but I don't have a free night to play around with you. Why don't you go keep an eye on your boss and make sure he doesn't kill himself or something for a while?" the blonde suggested.

"Nah, I think I'll stick around and bug you."

"Trust me, once I get home, the only thing in creation that can bug me is a half-Japanese psychopath that I'm going to have to kill one day," Trin remarked.

"Doesn't he ever go outside?" Shego wondered out loud. God, what kind of man was always underneath a woman that was not even his girlfriend?

"Why? You act like I would let you in my apartment anyway."

"Like I would need your damn permission."

Trin just rolled her eyes. She hoped that Shego was not planning to follow her home. She and Shin had never actually discussed having company over the apartment. They did not really have friends, so they did not have to worry. Shin never seemed to be so serious with a girlfriend to feel the urge to bring her over and Trin tried to never have a girlfriend near by so the question of coming over would never come up. If Shego was serious about coming over to the apartment, even if not right at that moment, it could pose a problem at some point in the near future. Trin wondered what she had gotten herself into while Shego wondered what would happen if she happened to stop by the apartment sometime soon.

-------------------

Next time: Shego in Trins room; Shin at a club thinking about his sexuality; Kim requests that she and Tatsu become a couple.


	3. What are we?

I don't own these characters, except Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. Disney owns all the rest.

3: What are we?

Trin was sitting in her room with her laptop in front of her. She had long ago decided that she hated any and all required courses outside of the ones in her majors. They just took up so much of her time; any time was too much in her opinion because she could be doing other things. She wished that she and Shin had decided on a different way to split the work that term, but they were trying to be equal that term. Never again, she silently decided.

The blonde was taken away from focusing on the screen of her computer and turned her attention to her window because she could hear tapping on the glass. She could not believe her eyes and had to flip her glasses up to make sure that she was seeing right. She saw the same thing with or without the glasses, which was Shego at her window.

"What in the hell?" Trin muttered.

"Will you open this damn thing?" Shego demanded.

"What the hell are you doing out there?" Trin inquired while getting up off of her bed and going to open the window.

Shego stepped in from the nippy weather outside. "I was taking in the view, of course," she remarked sarcastically.

"Don't take that tone with me just because your simple ass is freezing outside my window," the blonde replied while closing the window to prevent the biting fall air from further invading her toasty sanctuary.

"Hey, this is the thanks I get for deciding to grace you with my presence?" the green-skinned thief shot back.

"Oh, please. You only came here out of boredom. Your boss was probably ranting about something or another and you didn't want to hear it."

"Whether that's what happened or not, I came here when I could have been a million other places."

Trin went back to the bed and her work. "Excuse while I take the time to feel honored by your presence then. I'll let you know when I'm done with that," she commented.

Shego only rolled her eyes while taking her time to look around the room. It was painted a light pink, which did not surprise Shego since she had noticed Trin's favorite colors seemed to be pink and yellow. Her bedspread was yellow, as were her pillows. The floors were a nicely polished light-colored wood. She had a dresser with a vanity mirror, which was a light, creamy pink. The nightstand by the bed was a matching pink. Despite the color, it was actually a well put together room and it was clear to a trained eye that the furniture was not cheap.

The green-skinned woman went to look at the things resting on the dresser. She spotted Trin's perfume, which the blonde tended to smell like even after they spent an hour or so fighting. There was a tube of lip-gloss, but nothing else. Trin was apparently a neat-freak, which was expected. She did not even bother to inspect the closet, knowing what it would be full of, namely semiformal and formal wear. Instead, she went over to the bed.

"Do not sit on my bed in the clothes you were outside in, especially since you were just scaling the building," Trin said. She thought that was so disgusting when people sat on a bed in the clothing that they had just been outside in because they were just littering the clean bed with outside everything.

"Okay, fine," Shego replied with a bit of an attitude and she unbuttoned her pants.

"Oh, god, Shego, don't do that," Trin commanded, seeing the trouble that she just started.

"What? You don't want me on the bed in my clothes. I'm just trying to follow orders," the raven-haired femme fatale commented with a teasing smirk as she pulled her pants down.

"Damn it, Shego, were you raised by monkeys?" Trin inquired. She could not believe that Shego was actually stripping in front of her, even though she should have expected it since she kind of knew the emerald-eyed woman by now.

"Oh, you know you want to look at my sexy body," Shego remarked while stepping out of her pants. She was so glad that Trin expected her to be wild because she got to do crazy things, like strip in front of the hot blonde. She was also thankful for the excuse to do so; all because of Trin's big mouth. She wanted the younger female's attention while doing so too.

Trin frowned and tried hard not to look at the practically nude body to the right of her, but the temptation was too great. Look, contrary to popular belief, she was human and she was a lesbian and Shego was gorgeous, so she felt it necessary to at least sneak a peek. So, she glanced at the villainess, who was in her underwear of a black sports' bra and panties; she would have worn more flattering undergarments if she knew that she was going to be taking her close off in front of Trin. But, then Shego had to take things too far, in Trin's opinion.

Shego sat in the bed and pressed herself against Trin, knowing full well that the blonde disliked the contact. Shego smirked as Trin tried to lean away from her without moving from where she was. Trin huffed when her not-so-subtle getaway was not being respected.

"Shego, do you have to be so goddamn annoying?" the nineteen-year-old inquired.

"Uh-huh," the villainess answered, including a nod to be more irksome. She supposed that she should not enjoy getting on someone's nerves so much, but Trin made it so satisfying.

"Get off of me," Trin ordered while taking one hand from her keyboard to shove the thief away from her.

Shego resisted until Trin took her hand back to hasten her writing on her computer. The villainess took the opportunity to be even more of a pest and to creep Trin out. She leaned down, nuzzling her nose in Trin's shoulder blade.

"You smell good," Shego commented.

"Damn it, Shego!" Trin hollered. It was a good thing that Shin was out or he would have been in her room by now, demanding to know what the hell was going on, maybe even with a weapon because he might think that there was a threat in the house for her to uncharacteristically screaming. But, he had gone out to a club after she made sure he put on some acceptable clothing.

"What?" the thief asked with an innocent look that would make an angel jealous. She was pushed away and then given a look that would have slain a demon. She laughed, thoroughly amused with what was going on. She knew that coming to see Trin would entertain her.

Trin focused back on the screen of her computer while keeping watch on her uninvited guest out of the corner of her eye to make sure that Shego did not lean on her again. She hated touching so much and it did not help that she was in her pajamas, the top of which happened to be a camisole. So, they had skin contact because Shego wanted to be a smart-aleck and take off all of her clothing.

After a few seconds passed, Trin put most of her attention into her compute and work because she was getting into a flow. Shego waited for a while and then suddenly pounced on the blonde, pinning her to the bed, but not knocking the laptop off of the bed. Trin made a horrible noise; something that they were certain a trapped gazelle made when taken down by a pack of lions. Shego smirked.

"Damn it, Shego!" Trin screamed again.

"What? You know you like this," Shego commented while rubbing up against the blonde woman. She knew that she was enjoying it, especially as she took another whiff of Trin. Oh, she did smell heavenly. It was a subtle scent to her that was different from her perfume and it was almost addictive.

"Let me do my paper," Trin ordered.

"I'd rather do this," Shego replied and she continued to push her body against Trin's wonderful form. Oh, that did feel really good, she noted. She glanced down as she moved, watching their pale skin touch.

"Stop it," Trin seriously commanded. The feeling had not been wholly unpleasant, but she still hated that they were touching. People outside of her family touching her in any way just bothered the blonde.

The villainess knew that Trin was being quite serious in the order, but she was hoping that she could change that since the sensation was quite delightful. Trin would have to be insane to not like it, she thought. She continued her movement and noticed that Trin was not trying to escape. She knew that she had to be careful with everything because if she was too forceful, she would frighten Trin away, which could be dangerous thing. Damn it, if only Trin was like every other human on the planet and just could stand being touched without it having to be a cause to fight, Shego thought.

Trin was trying her best to not shudder in disgust at being touched in some many different places at one time. It was not entirely repulsive, she told herself and she was more than likely acting up from force of habit. Her brain automatically disagreed with Shego made the surprise move of kissing her; Shego thought that enough time had gone by to do such a thing.

Trin's brain commanded her to be completely grossed out and she obeyed almost instantly. Where had Shego been after all? How many other mouths had been kissed by the thief before hers? What had Shego eaten or drank before that? She did not know and she did not care. All she knew was that the mouth was one of the filthiest places on the human body and she would rather not have one come into contact with her own.

Shego noticed now that Trin was trying to subtly flee from her, so she tightened her hold on the blonde. She changed the tone of the kiss from near rough to almost gentle. She knew that she needed the contact to say that it was all right to stay. In the end, Trin's resistance won out and Shego pulled away because she needed to breathe. She did make sure to keep her face close to her companion's, in case the urge to start trouble again came up.

"Are you going to tell me you didn't enjoy that?" Shego inquired with an arrogant smirk, as if she knew the answer to the question.

"And if I didn't?" Trin countered. She could have liked it…maybe, if that disgusting kiss had not been added to the mix.

"I'm going to do it until you do like it," the villainess replied with a smirk on her face. She would do it too until Trin got over her obnoxious phobia of being touched. Damn eccentric geniuses, she silently huffed.

"What are you saying?" Trin asked because she really was not sure what Shego was trying to accomplish. Did Shego want to be her girlfriend? She had her doubts that they would work out if that was the case and she doubted that was the case anyway. Why the hell would Shego want to be her girlfriend after all? And also, why would she want to be Shego's girlfriend?

"I'm saying that I'm going to kiss you until you like it and want to kiss me back and then we're going to keep kissing," Shego explained. She wanted to do more than kissing, but she was going to have to build up to that with the blonde. It was a good thing that she loved a challenge.

"But, what would that mean?" Trin inquired.

"What does anything with us mean?"

Trin thought about that for a moment. What did anything mean between them? What were they to each other beyond stalker and stalked? If Shego did not seek her out, they might never see each other again and that was how they were with each other. What would adding the new dynamic do to them? Nothing, aside for make her want to vomit, her mind pointed out.

"I'm going to hurt you if you keep kissing me," Trin promised.

Shego smirked; that sounded like a real good challenge to her. She came in again and Trin struck back. While the thief was kissing her, Trin grabbed Shego's hand and proceeded to bend her hand backwards. The more pressure that Trin put on her wrist, the more pressure Shego put into the kiss. They knew that either Trin was going to run away from disgust or Shego was going to have a broken wrist by the time everything was said and done.

-------------------

Shin was sitting at the bar of a little club that he knew and found himself coming to more and more often. He was looking out into the people bouncing around on the dance floor. He would have been out there, but at the moment he just wanted to think about things for a while. Some might have thought that it would have been wiser to choose a quieter area to do some contemplating, but he was right where he wanted to be.

He had actually thought at first to go drive to Middleton for a while to see his girlfriend. But, he knew better than to visit Tatsu late at night. He had done it once before and he had learned his lesson. He had shown up unannounced, which did not bother Tatsu. It was what he wanted to do that got on her nerves. He had driven all that way and asked if she wanted to go out dancing. She had looked at him as if saying, "You're stupid and you should wear a sign that says so." She made things so hard, he always thought.

Tatsu did not dance and she did not go out, as far as he knew, giving him very little reason to visit. When he had stopped by that time, she had assumed that he was there for something else, something that he had not even thought of. Tatsu had thought that he showed up for sex, which he vehemently denied as the reason; he was not sure if she believed him or not.

He would never show up at a girl's house unannounced for the sole purpose of having sex. The idea for doing something like that seemed disrespectful in his opinion. And then, there was also the fact that he was not sure why, but he did not find himself, well, to be blunt, sexually attracted to Tatsu. He figured that he just needed to see her more often to clear that up because she was a pretty female, so he was not too alarmed by that.

He should have talked the harpy into coming out, he told himself as he did nothing around the club. Trin would come out clubbing with him sometimes; not too often, but sometimes. He had to smooth talk her a lot, but she would come out and they would do some dancing. He liked it because it got him a lot of attention to be dancing with a beautiful girl that moved well, once she got started anyway.

Shin decided to go be wild on the dance floor for a little while before he headed back home. As he got up from his seat, he noticed a guy looking at from the corner of his eye. He turned slightly to make sure it was not his imagination and, sure enough, there was a guy a few feet away, eyeing him. It was not the first time he ever caught a guy checking him out and he doubted that it would be the last. He laughed a bit to himself and then continued on his way.

Shin did not mind when dudes checked him. He liked the attention and such things stroked his confidence. He knew he was good-looking, but things like that confirmed it in his opinion. He was so damn sexy that he attracted both men and women. It was a win/win thing for him until guys tried to talk to him. Then things got a little awkward, not because he disliked it, but because he had to go into explaining why the fellow had wasted his time.

The half-Japanese teen hated to explain that he was not gay. He also detested it when people assumed he was. He just disliked being called something that he was not and he did not think, no wait, he knew that he was not gay. After all, he looked at girls all the time and he thought that no gay man would do such a thing.

He dismissed those things and went to get some dancing done. Well, he tried to dismiss those thoughts. He mind did continue to scoff at the very idea of him possibly being gay. As if something like that were feasible, he commented mentally. He had had too many girlfriends to be gay. He had more girlfriends than Trin, so he could not be gay, he told himself.

Sure, he never kept those girlfriends long and he tried them more like friends than anything else, but he was not a homosexual. He even had a current girlfriend, further proving that he was not a homosexual. Well, he was pretty sure that he was not. And then, he realized that he was devoting more thought to the subject than he liked, so he shook it out of his mind and started dancing his heart out.

Shin left the club late that night or early that morning depending on who was asked. He walked home; he preferred walking to driving because he felt like he was less likely to kill himself on his feet than behind the wheel of a car. When he got in, the apartment was dark and silent, which he expected. He peeked into Trin's room to see if she was still up with the papers or if she was asleep.

Trin was still up, typing away at the computer. She greeted him by telling him to go take a shower since they had class in the morning and she refused to go with someone who smelled like smoke and sweat. He expected that and went about his business. Trin continued typing; she was glad that Shego had left a few minutes ago.

----(New day)

Tatsu was buried in the front end of a car when a knock on the garage door distracted her from work. She went to the door and opened it, even though it was not locked. She was not surprised to see who was there, namely Kim because the redhead visited her almost daily. She was surprised by what Kim was holding, though.

"What's this?" Tatsu asked while motioning slightly to the bags that were in the redhead's hands.

"Oh, just some stuff I thought you could use," Kim answered with a bright smile, hoping to smooth things over with her expression if it was a problem with her buy things for the mechanic.

"Like what?" Tatsu inquired while taking the bags from Kim and stepping aside in order to allow the younger teen to come in.

"Well, for starters, a couple of new tee-shirts," Kim answered as she shut the door behind her. She had brought the older female some new clothing point blank because Tatsu needed new gear in her opinion.

"New tee-shirts?" the mechanic echoed and then she looked down at the bags, attempting to see the shirts.

"Yeah, a few of the ones you have, I noticed were kind of worn out and have holes in them, so I got you some new ones when I went to the mall," the hero explained.

"Um…thanks," Tatsu said in a rather uncomfortable tone. Even though she was used to Kim being nice to her by now, new shirts seemed a bit much. No one ever brought her new shirts. She had to take care of things like that for herself and her life had been like that for about a decade now.

"You don't like them, do you? It was a bit much?" Kim asked because she had been worrying about that.

"No, it wasn't," Tatsu tried to assure the adventurer. "It's just…I'm not used to this," she added to show that it was not a problem.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. Thanks a lot for this," Tatsu said with conviction to make sure she was believed.

The blue-eyed girl never knocked anyone for doing something nice for her since it was so rare and she could tell that Kim was sincere and did not want something from her like other people when they did nice things for her. She wished that she could return the favor, but she was not too sure how. And then, she thought of something.

"Want to go out for a movie?" Tatsu offered. From what she knew about Kim, the redhead liked the movies as much as the next person. She thought that it would be nice of her to at least pay for a movie and snacks, even though she had done so on three other occasions that they went to the movies.

"Spanking," Kim replied with a smile.

"Okay, let me put these things away somewhere and then we'll go," Tatsu said and she went to put the shirts as well as whatever else was in the bags away. An idea hit her as she was returning to Kim. "I'll drive us there," the mechanic declared.

"Cool," Kim said. She knew that Tatsu could drive and everything, but she hardly ever saw Tatsu do it.

As they went out, they both noted something that they dared not speak, but it seemed like they were on a date and that seemed to come across every time that they went out now. It was weird because whenever they went out, Tatsu would pay for everything, no matter how much Kim protested. And then there were the visits by Kim, where she tended to come bearing gifts and how she made sure that Tatsu stocked up on certain types of food, hoping to get the mechanic to eat right.

Tatsu and Kim watched each other out of the corner of their eyes as Tatsu drove Kim home after the movie. Tatsu was about to turn onto Kim's block, but the redhead stopped her. Kim requested that Tatsu keep driving for a little while.

"Why?" Tatsu asked while continuing on, even though she would have preferred to drop the younger teen off and get back to her garage.

"I want to ask you something," Kim explained.

"Go ahead," Tatsu said with a shrug.

"Do we seem weird to you?"

"We…weird?" Tatsu echoed in a confused tone. She was not following.

"Like our hanging out, does it seem weird to you?" Kim asked.

The blue-eyed female shrugged. Hanging out point blank was weird for her. Other than Kim, the only person she allowed to be around her for hours was her boyfriend and she did not see him as often as she saw Kim. She was actually happy that she did not seem him as often because he could get annoying, really annoying. Kim was nowhere near as irksome as Shin was in her opinion.

Kim sighed; she guessed that she was going to have to spell it out. "Are we…dating?" she inquired.

Tatsu was not sure how to answer that, so she shrugged. Could she even be dating Kim when she was dating Shin? Well, she did pretty much the same thing with both of them, she commented mentally. Actually, she did more with Kim than with Shin, mainly because she could tell him "no" and it would not hurt his feelings. Shin would take the answer and keep on moving, being annoying in the process most of the time because he would still bug her about things.

"Is that what you want?" Tatsu asked. She had never considered herself bisexual or anything like that, but she had never thought about it. At the moment, her brain just pointed out that she dated guys when she could stand being around them for a couple of hours, so why not date Kim when she could stand her better than almost any dude? Her only problem was that she was still with Shin, but she did not even bring that up.

"Well…if it doesn't change anything between us too much. I mean, I really like being around you and I think you're great looking," Kim explained. She did not add that she suspected that she was a lesbian. She thought that it might be a good time to start exploring that possibility.

"Okay," Tatsu agreed with a shrug. It was unbelievable that she made it that easy, but then again, that was how Tatsu was once she was comfortable around someone. Kim could not help smiling; obviously, Tatsu had given the correct answer.

-------------------

Next time: Shego is sporting an injury that Kim find curious while Shin is rudely rebuffed by Tatsu. Just a lot of weird behavior.


	4. A regular day

I don't own these characters, except for Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. The rest belong to Disney.

4: A regular day

Shego stared at her bandaged wrist and wondered what it was she had gotten herself into. That Trin was a hell cat if never there was one, but she enjoyed being around her, for a reason that was beyond her. It was almost like being around Kim without all of the self-righteous rigmarole and all of the "goody-goodiness." The fighting was a bit more intense too since Trin did not seem to know the difference between sparring and regular fighting. So, it was good to be around Trin and she accepted it as that, knowing that she might have to put up with a little pain to go with her pleasure.

Damn Trin and her quirks, she silently cursed. Shego had plans to work past them because a woman like Trin did not need to live her life frightened or disgusted with being touched, especially by her. She knew that the blonde liked the attention, but she had to get the nineteen-year-old to stop resisting out of habit as she knew the college student was doing. She knew that she had a job ahead of her, but she was going to work through it.

-------------------

Tatsu stared at the ceiling while lying in her bed, which was little more than a cot. She did not need or want much in regards to comfort or luxury, which was evident from the fact that she lived in a shack behind her garage. She could not sleep, which was nothing new. She tended to stay awake most nights, unable to sleep for various reasons. She supposed that it was a good thing that she made her own hours for work or she would have been fired from her job a long time ago due to her sleeping habits. The thing keeping her awake now was the fact that she had agreed to date Kim.

She was not sure why she had done that. She did not regret the decision, only the fact that she made it while she was in a relationship with Shin. It was just that she felt like she was more in a relationship with Kim than with Shin. She guessed that if that was the case, she should tell Kim about Shin, but she was pretty sure that news like that would not be taken well. She liked having Kim around, so she did not want to do anything that might keep Kim from coming to visit her or not want to do things with her.

"Stupid," Tatsu berated herself. She knew that she had already screwed things up. Nothing ever went her way for long, she reminded herself. That was just life. Her life.

-------------------

Kim tossed and turned in her bed, trying to get comfortable enough to go to sleep. She was a bit troubled about her decision to date Tatsu. She liked Tatsu very much, but she wondered if she was just using Tatsu to discover her sexual preferences. If that was the case, would that be right? How else would she know what she was, though if she did not experiment?

She was happy that Tatsu agreed to date her, but she was already starting to consider that she did not feel _that_ way about Tatsu. Maybe that was why she was feeling guilty. She liked Tatsu, but maybe she liked her as a friend and nothing more. Or maybe she was just nervous that she might actually be…_that_ way. What would people think? What would her parents think? What would her big sister think? Questions like that built anxiety in her.

-------------------

Trin was brushing her teeth for the third time. She had gotten a visit from Shego again that night, which involved a lot of struggling on her end while making out. It was not the first time and she doubted that it would be the last time. She hated to think that Shego was winning the battle. After all, the first time it had happened, she had almost broken Shego's wrist to get her to stop and she had brushed her teeth almost a dozen times that night. Now, she was down to three and she doubted that Shego's wrist was even bruised from that session.

Worst yet, Trin was starting to believe that she was only brushing her teeth to out of force of habit. That would mean that she was actually getting pleasure from Shego's assaults on her. It was an odd thing for some reason that was beyond her, but getting pleasure from Shego seemed just as outrageous as her getting pleasure from, say, Shin. She could not figure out why that was.

-------------------

Shin was hanging off of his bed sideways, his ebony hair almost touching his carpeted floor. He had called Tatsu earlier and she had not even bothered to answer the phone. It was a first. Even if she did not want to talk, she would acknowledge his call by answering and just inform him that she was working or something like that. He wondered why she would not answer.

He considered that she might be upset with him. He was not the best boyfriend that she could ask for. He did not do special things for her, take her out, or even buy her nice things unless his evil twin told him that he needed to get off of his lazy ass and do something for her. But, even though he never did things like that and Tatsu still answered his calls. He could not figure it out; something was probably wrong.

----(New day)

Kim stood to face Shego as Ron ran off to figure out away to stop Drakken's latest doom's day device, or doom's day disaster as Ron was starting to look at the machines. The redhead stared at Shego, who stared back. And then the hero spied something weird; Shego's hand was wrapped in a bandage. Who in the world was strong enough to injure Shego? No, that had to be an accident or something like that.

"Shego, what happened to your hand?" Kim asked curiously because she really wanted to know how the villainess had gotten hurt. She just needed to be sure that it was an accident or something.

The pale woman laughed a bit. She hated to think what Trin might do to her if she told Kim, "nothing, your freaky anti-touch sister just didn't like where I was putting my hand." Once Trin heard about that, they were both going to need a lot of bandages, Shego figured. She was not in the mood to go through that.

"Something that was worth it," the thief opted to respond with devilish and amused smirk.

"Like what?" the redhead inquired because she really wanted to know.

Shego decided to stop the question-and-answer session by going at Kim. She was not looking to share how she enjoyed her time off. Besides, she doubted that Kim really wanted to know, even if the teen thought that she did.

The pair got into their usual tussle. While moving with Kim, Shego noted the differences between the hero and her older sister. Trin was much more deliberate in her movements and devilishly calculating. Kim was smoother when she moved and much more defensive than her sister could ever imagine being; she was almost like water while Trin was a well wielded blade. Kim was not looking to hurt someone too much when she fought while Trin was looking to make her opponent think really hard on coming at her a second time. Shego found herself thinking that she preferred Kim's style to her sister's; there was something about the fluid motion that got to her.

Kim noticed a change in Shego too, beyond the bandaged hand. The green-skinned woman's seemed even more aware of her movements than usual. Now, she understood that they had been fighting for a while now, but it seemed too much for the infrequency with which they saw each other. Shego was fighting her now almost as if they battled each other every day; the truth of the matter would be that Shego fought with Trin almost every day.

They went at each other for a few minutes until they heard Ron and Drakken yelling, which was followed by an explosion. They stopped as more explosions followed at an alarming rate. Ron came running toward them.

"K. P, let's get out here! Drakken's thingy is blowing itself up!" Ron explained in his usual excited tone while running off. He had not even touched anything for once. The machine just suddenly started going off on its own. Something had to be wrong with Drakken, the blonde concluded because of the faulty work.

Shego sucked her teeth and rolled her eyes. Leave to Drakken's incompetence to spoil her fun. She had been enjoying working up a sweat with the redhead. Now, she had to go make sure Drakken got out of the place all right and she had to make sure that she got out all right. She would have kept an eye on Team Possible too, but she knew that they would be able to take care of themselves, or so she hoped. She doubted that Trin would want to ever see her again if Kimmie died while fighting against her.

"Later, Princess," Shego sneered as she ran off to find Drakken and give Kim the chance to run off with Ron.

"That seemed a little weird," Ron commented while watching Shego bolt off with an arched eyebrow. Usually, she would have stuck around to try to get them trapped in the lair or she would have had one last trick up her sleeve. She never just ran off.

"Yeah," Kim agreed. The two heroes dashed off as another explosion sounded through the lair. Kim did glance back; she was not sure why.

----(New day)

"Shin, don't you think you should go see your girlfriend since we have today off?" Trin suggested. She had plans once she got him out of the apartment to hopefully curl up on the sofa and get some reading in before Shego showed up; the pale woman had called and said that she was coming over. It was up to Trin to get Shin out of the house or explain to him that she was going to have company. She was going with the easier one.

"You think?" Shin asked as he was about to sit down in an armchair and started playing some video games on the living room television instead of using the set in his room.

"When was the last time you saw her?" the blonde inquired. If she had such an indifferent girlfriend…no, she would not care, actually. She would just let the girl continue being indifferent until she figured out that it was time to call it quits. Maybe Shin's girlfriend was the same, she thought.

"Hmm…" Shin contemplated that question for more seconds than most mates should.

"Yeah, when you have to think like that, it's time to go see your girl," Trin pointed out quite seriously. "Without killing the car," she added because he had to be told things like that or she would have to put up with stories later on that started with "you won't believe what happened…"

Shin sighed and put his game controller down. He went to go put on some clothes that would not get him stopped at the door by his evil twin and then he was on his way. He did not bother with calling Tatsu since she seemed to be flipping a coin on if she was going to answer or not. If she did not want to be bothered with him when he showed up, he could always go see his parents and Trin's parents. He could also check up on Trin's younger redheaded clone, so it would not be a wasted trip.

Trin was glad that Shin left. She wanted Shego to show up, even though she planned to struggle with the pale woman as always. She guessed that she liked the company, but then again, she liked Shin's company too. Hell, she even liked Shin's kisses; they had made out once in junior high in a failed attempt to have sex with each other. The thought of having sex with Shin was close to vomit inducing, but then again, the idea of sex point blank turned her stomach and that did not change if she considered sex with Shego.

The blonde decided not think about that. She grabbed the book that she wanted to read and got to that, knowing that it would be impossible to do such a thing when the villainess arrived. She made it through a good deal of the piece of literature before she heard a very small noise. She turned around from her seat on the sofa, facing her room.

"You should be in your room," Shego commented almost as if she was scolding the blonde while stalking toward the couch.

"I'll be wherever I choose," Trin replied nonchalantly and then she noticed a mark on Shego's face. "What happened to your lip?" she asked, almost sounding curious, but she caught herself and sounded as she usually did.

"What? Oh, this?" Shego then licked the bruise as the corner of her mouth. "Your damn sister kicked the hell out of me," she explained as if it was nothing.

"That's my Mini-me," Trin remarked proudly, nodding to further express pride in her little sister.

"Yeah, she got me good," Shego muttered in agreement. She had not thought that the little hero had it in her to whack her a good one, but it would seem she was wrong. She was silently impressed. "And I'm going to take it out on you," she decided.

"Come over here and I'll finish what my little sister started," Trin declared confidently.

Shego only smirked as she stood before Trin and then she lowered herself onto the sofa. Trin retreated from the advance somewhat, as far as the back of the couch would allow her anyway. Shego continued coming and attacked the blonde in her usual fashion when they were in the house, she kissed Trin. As expected, Trin resisted, but not too much.

-------------------

Shin arrived at Tatsu's place surprisingly intact. She was surprised to see him when she answered the door. They stood there looking awkwardly at each other, almost as if they did not know what they should do. And then, Tatsu recalled that Kim said she would be back; she had run off earlier due to a mission. It would not be in her best interest for Shin to be there when Kim finally did return.

"What are you doing here?" the mechanic inquired almost rudely.

"Want to go to a race?" he countered, not paying much mind to her curt question. He did not even think to kiss or hug her as a greeting.

"I have work," Tatsu answered.

Shin shrugged; he tried. "Okay, well, I'm going to go hit the races. I'll come back by you before I leave to go home," he said.

"You don't have to if you don't want to," she assured him.

Shin shrugged again. Tatsu made it so easy to be her boyfriend, he thought. She was not nearly as demanding as the other girls that he dated. He needed to stay with her, he thought; while he was lazy anyway. There was always a chance that someone new would wander by him and distract him and he would happily be distracted by that person.

"So, bye," Tatsu bid him farewell rather hastily.

Before Shin could react to that, Tatsu shut the door on his face. Now, that he thought was weird. It was like she did not want him around. He knew that she was like that with most other people, but she typically tolerated his presence. She had never slammed a door in his face before.

He walked off, lacking a better thing to do. He went to the races like he wanted to and experienced something that happened often at the races. A few of the male drivers gave him looks, come-hither stares. He smirked to himself; he swore that it was just because he loved the attention. Once he was done, having fun placing bets and drinking, he ended up going to party with a bunch of the drivers afterwards.

-------------------

Kim showed up at Tatsu's place minutes after Shin left. Tatsu greeted her with a small peck on the mouth, which caused Kim to smile. Kim thought it was a bit funny that Tatsu was so considerate and knew the right things to do in a relationship for the most part, yet almost everyone around town thought that the blue-eyed woman was some kind of monster. She knew for a fact that people's perceptions of someone was not always even close to accurate; after all, the whole freaking town hated her big sister and Trin was extraordinary in her opinion.

"How was your mission thing?" Tatsu inquired while looking Kim over and noticing a few band-aids on her arms.

"It went pretty good," Kim answered and then she saw the mechanic looking at her injuries. "Don't mind these. They're not deep," she assured the older teen.

"What happened?"

"Oh, well, Shego, that's the sidekick to the mad scientist I'm always going after, came at me to fight like we usually do. We fought like usual, but then she just suddenly slashed me. In return, I kicked her pretty hard in the face. For some weird reason, she apologized to me and said that she scratched me before for a quick second she forgot who I was," Kim explained.

The hero had actually done a move that reminded Shego of Trin while they were fighting and she reacted like she would with Trin, realizing too late that she was battling the little sister. It was a good thing that she would not hurt Trin up too badly or she might have cut Kim alarmingly deep, but the wounds were no worse than if Kim had cut herself on a pushpin. Kim had kicked her so hard in the face more on instinct than anything else.

"Well, did you get the bad guy?" Tatsu asked curiously.

"No, I didn't. I stopped his plot and everything, but he got away again as his lair started blowing up on its own again," the redhead answered with a bit of a disappointed expression. Drakken was going to be the death of her and Ron one day, she thought with the way his machines were now spontaneously combusting.

Tatsu put her arm around Kim's shoulders to lift the younger girl's spirits. "You did your best and you saved the world anyway. You'll get the bad guy next time, I'll bet," the mechanic said in her usual mumbled tone.

The redhead smiled a bit. "You're too smooth for your own good, you know," she commented.

"Not smooth," Tatsu objected. She just liked making Kim feel wanted and good about herself because the redhead was trying to do the same for her. She thought that it was the least that she could do.

"Very smooth. So, are you going to take me out for saving the world or are do you have work?" Kim inquired.

"I could take you out," Tatsu replied. She did not like the idea much since Shin was wandering around the neighborhood, but it was big town and she was certain that she could avoid the places that he haunted when he was around. She would rather that than waiting around in the garage when Shin might just show up again.

Kim smiled again and they went out. When they were outside, they behaved like friends. Tatsu was not a fan of public displays it seemed, which was good because Kim was not looking to be openly homosexual around anyone. She had not even told anyone that she was, not Ron, not her sister, and those were her closest confidants. She never thought that she would keep secrets from them until now.

-------------------

Next time: Shin and Trin discuss their relationships. Tatsu thinks over her relationships and more things blow up thanks to Drakken to the point he could be the death of Kim and Ron.


	5. Assume nothing

I don't own these characters, except for Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. Everyone else belongs to Disney.

5: Assume nothing

Shin thought that it was odd as he called Tatsu, but she did not pick up. It was now happening more often than not and he was not sure what to make of it. He went over to her place a few times and most of the time he was turned away. She was acting weird, he thought. She was acting like not only did she not want to be bothered with him, but she did not even want to acknowledge his existence.

"I think my girlfriend is cheating on me," Shin commented as if it was nothing, telling Trin that information. He thought that would explain why she was acting so strangely, even though he did not think that Tatsu was the type to cheat. She just did not seem to like being around people.

The best friends were lounging on the sofa in their living room in their pajamas. Trin was leaning on the couch while Shin was leaning on her, which was his way of hinting that he wanted her to brush his hair for him sometime that night. She was silently refusing; the lazy bum needed to do something for himself, she huffed mentally. He knew that if he kept it up, she would cave and brush his hair for him. He just had to out last her.

"Can you blame her?" Trin riposted, almost as if she did not care.

"Are you siding with her?" he inquired.

"Maybe. I mean, what have you done for her?" the blonde pointed out.

Shin shut up from that. He supposed that it did not even matter. He had known that he and Tatsu were not going to work out from almost the start of things. She had never seemed too enthused about the relationship in the first place and he never seemed that way about girlfriends anyway.

He was starting to wonder about himself too. He had been doing a lot of clubbing lately and he was starting to note that more and more often, his attention was shifting toward guys in the room that were looking at him. Sometimes, while a girl was speaking to him, he would not even be paying her any mind due to the fact that a male would have his attention.

"Trin, how did you know you were gay?" Shin asked as if it was nothing at all, like that had been talking about the whole time.

"Why do you want to know?" she countered in a similar tone.

"Because I do."

"Well, you can't have everything you want. Why, does God's gift to women think he's gay?" Trin teased a bit.

Shin rolled his chocolate eyes. He did often act like he was God's gift to the opposite sex. He knew that he could get girls easily, and often did. It was just that for a long time, he found his mind wandering to the same sex. It was happening a lot more now and he was not sure why. Maybe it had to do with the fact that Tatsu was being flakey with him and it was not the other way around like it usually was when he was with a girl. It just seemed like as more time passed, it was going to be something that he was going to have to look into. He was going to have to explore the same gender, he believed.

"How are things going with you and your girlfriend?" Shin inquired.

"Did I ever say I had a girlfriend?" Trin countered.

"Of course not, but I can read your mind, duh," he commented, as if that was the truth. He was around her enough and knew her well enough to where he pretty much could read her mind most of the time.

"Ah, yes, I continuously forget about this power since you never wash the dishes when I'm thinking you should," she remarked.

"You never think it fast enough."

"Ah." Trin nodded as if that made sense; it made sense coming from him anyway.

"So, what's the deal with you and your girlfriend? I know you wait for her after class when you shoo me off," he stated.

Trin rolled her eyes. "So?"

"Well, what's up with her? You've been with her longer than any other girl, haven't you?" he asked.

"So what of it? You've been with your girlfriend longer than any other girl too, but you two don't seem to be doing much. Besides, she's not my girlfriend," the blonde answered. She had no idea what Shego was to her and she typically did not think about it. Whatever the hell they were, they seemed to be doing fine by them…sort of anyway.

Whatever she had with Shego seemed lacking, but Trin would never admit that, not even to herself. There was a void in between them and neither thought on what it might be. They were similarly skeptical on things since they got along as best could be expected, so they were not looking to trouble the waters at the moment. But, she suspected that they were lacking a certain amount of trust that should exist between mates, which was probably why they never thought of each other as girlfriends.

"She's not your girlfriend? You mean you ditch me for a friend?" Shin scoffed in disbelief. His harpy did not make friends. She had associates and girlfriends. Associates were for business and girlfriends were for whatever semblance of pleasure Trin got since she disliked touching, loathed kissing, and actually believed that sex should be considered criminal when it came to her. She would never leave him for a simple associate while she would do so for a girlfriend, as she had a habit of wanting girls to feel somewhat special while with her for whatever brief period of time they would be together.

"Must you be silly?" she retorted.

"Well, excuse the hell out of me for knowing you. So, explain to me how things are with this girl who is not your girlfriend," he said.

"They are…" Trin paused and considered the best way to put things and it caused her to shudder when the first and possibly best way to explain things hit her. "It's like being with you," she said. It had crossed her mind a few times, but now she realized that was how things actually were.

"Like being with me?" he echoed in a puzzled tone.

"Yes, it's like being with you if you had breasts. She and I spar like I do with you, just as hard too. We speak to each other in the same manner that I do with you. She demands my attention whenever she's with me just like you do and she gets on my nerves just like you do. Uncle Shin did not have children before you, did he?" she inquired.

"I am the one and only, baby," Shin declared with pride. He doubted that he would have been born if his father had had a child before him. His parents would have seen what they were working with and realized that they needed to focus all of their attention on keeping their insane offspring from dying, which was what they did with him. They did a good job, although he did keep them on their toes, making sure to come close to death at least once a month when he was little.

"Yeah, who would want more after you?" she remarked.

"So, what you're saying is, if I had breasts, you'd let me screw you mindless?" he asked, almost as if it was something that he wanted to do. He actually never had been inclined to want to have sex with his evil twin. He did find himself looking at her sometime, but nothing too deep to the point where he would want to screw her. She was like a sister to him, after all.

"I didn't say all that. You have a girlfriend that you need to screw."

Shin arched an eyebrow. How did she know? He had to find out. "How'd you know I haven't screwed her yet?"

"You're not the only mind reader around here. Besides, you've told me enough information for me to surmise that you've done very little with your girlfriend, like most of your girlfriends. You almost seem anti-touch," she commented dryly.

He did not argue. Most of his girlfriends, he never did do anything with. He was no virgin, but he did not sleep with as many girls as he could, which was weird for him. Shin was close to the very definition of hedonism and yet, he did not indulge in the flesh too often. They both knew that was strange.

"So, you were saying your girlfriend is cheating on you," Trin said, waiting for him to elaborate on that. She continuously said "girlfriend" because he never bothered to tell her the names of his girls and she never bothered to tell him the names of hers. It was almost as if they thought if they did not give the girls' names then they did not exist to the other and they could always see themselves as the centers of each other's universe.

"Probably."

"You're calm about this. It's rather surprising," the blonde commented. She had never had a girl cheat on her, but she could see it in their eyes plenty of times that they wanted to. She could do a lot of things for her girls, but physical pleasure was asking way too much of her. She cringed just thinking about it.

She was not sure what she would do if she did have a girl cheat on her. It would bother her, especially if the girl tried to kiss her after she found out that she was being two-timed. She already often wondered where the hell someone's mouth had been when the person kissed her, but to know that it was on someone else's filthy mouth and now the person was trying to kiss her, the very idea made her want to throw up.

"I know," he agreed. He did not know why he was so calm about it, but it really did not bother him if Tatsu was cheating on him. What had he done to hold on to her, after all? He just wished that she would break up with him instead of doing something that was actually unlike her. It would actually make things easier on him too because he would not have to worry about her anymore and he could do whatever he wanted without having to think about needing to spend time with her.

-------------------

Tatsu herself could not believe that she was cheating, on both Kim and Shin in her opinion since she had not said anything to either of them about the other one. She felt rather bad about it too; the guilt slowly eating away at her. She knew that eventually she was going to have to do something, probably break up with Shin. She would just need to get the guilt to stop; she hated the feeling.

She told herself that she should have done something, like break up with Shin, a long time ago. She and Shin got along rather well, but they probably never should have been a couple. She did not like many of the things he did. She was not looking to party at all while that was one of his favorite things. He did not like to take her out when it was just them, like on a regular date. He hardly ever hugged or kissed her. It was just so obvious that they should have never been a couple, she told herself.

It did not matter. She did not know what she was going to do about everything. She did not like lying, especially to Kim, but she knew that if she told the truth, Kim would be hurt and she would probably want to break up. She liked having Kim around because the redhead took her into consideration whenever they did something together. It was not something that she was used to and she had grown to appreciate and like it. She did not want to lose that and she did not want to cause agony to the person that made her feel so wonderful.

"I did this to myself," Tatsu commented to the air, sounding rather angry about things.

She did not feel sorry for herself because it was her fault. She had made the mess, so she needed to figure out how she could get herself out of it. She guessed that the first thing to do would be to break things off with Shin. She doubted that he would care if she broke things off because he more than likely knew that they were hardly in a relationship at all. He was a very smart guy, after all.

She was not sure what she would have to do after that. Should she or would she tell Kim? She knew that if she kept her mouth shut, it was unlikely that Kim would ever know. After all, who would be able to tell her? Only she and Shin knew that they were dating and she doubted that someone like Shin knew someone like Kim.

But, it would not be right, her mind told her. She cared about Kim and she would rather be honest with the redhead than sneaky. She sighed; relationships were such trouble. She hated having to think so much on something and still not know what to do. She would rather be in a situation that just allowed her to act, where she almost instinctively knew what to do. Right now, she was not sure if there was a solution to her problem. Not a favorable solution anyway.

"Look at what you did, idiot," Tatsu berated herself. She figured that she was going to lose Kim either way. The guilt would get to her if she did not tell and if she did tell, it would hurt Kim and she was willing to bet that a smart girl like Kim would not want anything more to do with her. She was going to be all alone again.

It never would have bothered her in the past to be alone, but she did like Kim. She liked being around her and doing things with her. Hell, to a small extent, she liked being around Shin too, but with the way he acted, there was a chance that he would still want to be friends. The problem was that he just was not the same kind of good company as Kim was.

Tatsu wished that she could stop thinking about it. She did not want to trouble herself with her screw up, but since it was her screw up, it stayed on her mind. She knew what she was going to have to do after a while and that did not help ease her mind.

-------------------

"What is wrong with Drakken? Why does everything blow up now!" Ron hollered in a tone of disbelief as he and Kim were trying to escape yet another lair of her arch-foe. Ron really wanted to know why every time they went after Drakken now an explosion had to follow. It was not even like they were causing things to blow up. Fires were just going off and sparks were flying on their own. It was mighty sloppy work in Ron's opinion; most people would agree with him.

"I don't know, but I wish he would get his act together," Kim said and then she noticed bits of the ceiling breaking off. "Look out, Ron!" She jumped to push Ron out of the way and saved him from having debris collapse on top of him.

Ron stumbled because of the suddenness of the shove, but the sound of things crashing to the floor let him know why he had been pushed. He turned around to make sure that Kim was still with him and not buried underneath the ceiling. He breathed a sigh of relief that she was all right. He grabbed her by the hand and they continued on their way, trying to get out of the self-destructing lair in tact.

They made it to an exit just as more of the ceiling was caving in. Kim pushed Ron once more to make sure that he got through the exit. He fell into the snow outside, but quickly turned around, looking for Kim. He did not see her and his heart sank.

"K.P!" Ron screamed at the top of his lungs hoping for an answer. "K.P!" he continued to yell as he tried digging through the snow and junk from the lair. To compound his problems, there was a snow slide and he lost his place. "No, no, no! KIM!" he hollered as tears gathered in his eyes and he just started digging where he now stood.

"What the hell are you screaming about?" Shego inquired as she climbed out of the snow, shaking the cold, white powder out of her hair.

"K.P's trapped in there!" Ron answered, not thinking about who he was talking to. He just knew that he needed help finding the redheaded hero.

"Trapped? What the hell do you mean?" Shego asked in a frantic tone.

"She's in this mess somewhere!"

"Damn it! Okay, you search there and I'll search on the opposite side," Shego said.

Ron agreed because he would take any help he could. Hell, the devil himself could have shown up right now and offered to look in exchange for the blonde's immortal soul and Ron would have readily agreed. He began searching for the missing redhead and Shego did the same.

Shego's heart was in her throat as she looked around for Kim. She hoped that everything turned out all right and not because she did not want Trin's little sister to die. It was because she did not want Kim to die. She was not sure what she would do with herself if something like that happened.

Shego and Ron lost sight of each other as they continued their search. As minutes ticked by, Ron began getting colder and colder and to make matters worse, it started snowing. Shego did not really notice the freezing weather since her powers kept her warm. They continued searching and then Shego dug up a slender, small hand. She yanked until the arm connected to the hand emerged from the snow, which was followed by the body of the unconscious hero. Shego breathed a sigh of relief.

A million things flooded the thief at once as she saw how blue Kim was. Among the things that she felt were dread and sorrow, thinking that she might be too late. She felt anger toward herself, Drakken, and even Ron if Kim was dead; Drakken had put Kim in the situation, she had delayed Kim in the situation, and Ron was supposed to be there to help Kim, but obviously did not. She even felt some disappointment in Kim for being such an idiot as to get caught up in some of Drakken's madness. But, then her mind reminded her that Kim needed help and Ron was probably freezing to death looking for his best friend.

Shego checked to make sure Kim still had a pulse and then she searched for Kim's communication device. She started walking while holding onto Kim and trying to figure how to contact Ron on the thing. She did not want to end up saving Kim only to have the redhead find out that Ron froze to death looking for her. Once she figured out how to call Ron, she kept her eyes open for shelter in the snow storm while ordering Ron just to get off the stupid mountain while he could. She promised him that he would see Kim soon enough. He obeyed because of the weather and he was very close to dying from exposure; he hoped that she was telling him the truth.

The pale woman eventually found a small cabin, which was good enough for her. There was not much in the place, but there was a bed for her to lay Kim in to warm the girl up. She stripped Kim from the wet clothing that she was wearing and then wrapped her in the blanket on the bed. She also stripped out of her own clothing, which was also wet and laid down next to Kim. She thought that the added body heat would help Kim.

Now that she had a chance to collect her thoughts, Shego asked herself what the hell was she doing. Why was she so worried? And as she stared at Kim, it hit her. All those times she was trying not to hurt Kim, it was not because she did not want to upset Trin, but just because she did not want to hurt Kim. She liked being around Kim; she liked Kim for some reason, just the vibe that the teen gave off, the type of person that she was. She liked Kim.

-------------------

Next time: break ups all around!


	6. Discovery

I don't own these characters, except for Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. Disney owns the rest.

6: Discovery

Shin could not take it anymore. He had let his thoughts nag him enough. He was going to have to find out if he was gay or not. He was the kind of guy that just dived right into things, so he was going to dive right into that. He went to a club and picked up a guy that he thought was good looking and worth experimenting with. Shin also made it clear to the guy that he was conducting an experiment. He made it sound fun, yet scientific at the same time, which was how everything was to him.

The guy did not seem too offended by Shin's words, which was good enough for the half-Japanese male. Shin knew that he needed someone that was not looking for a relationship or something like that. He was starting to believe that he was not made for relationships considering the effect, or lack there of, that he put forth in every single one that he had.

-------------------

After rescuing Kim from a frozen grave, Shego realized that she liked Kim. More than liked, actually. She cared about Kim and that made her life more complicated than it would have been under different circumstances. It went beyond the fact that Kim was the hero and she was villain, but also the fact that she had a thing going on with Kim's older sister. Life was so hard suddenly.

Did she risk telling Kim? What if Kim rejected her and then what if Kim went and told Trin about how her foe had attempted to pick her up? She would be out of both sisters then and she definitely did not want that. She liked Trin and all, but she was certain that she felt something much deeper for Kim now that she knew the teenager was not going to die. What was she supposed to do? She was not sure.

-------------------

Tatsu knew what she had to do. At least she was pretty sure what she had to do. She was never too sure where she picked up a conscience, as she was certain that she did not inherit the little voice in her head. But, she was glad that she had it. She would rather do the right thing, even if it was going to hurt like hell later on. Well, she would rather do the right thing for someone that she cared about anyway.

So, she was going to have to break up with Shin and she was going to have to tell Kim about how she had been in a relationship while she was with Kim. She doubted that it was going to go well, but she knew that she needed to get it out of the way. She needed to be honest with Kim and with Shin. She liked both of them, so she thought that they at least deserved her honesty.

-------------------

Trin was alone in the apartment. She was lounging on the sofa with a book and some popcorn, just loving the silence that came along with Shin not being around. But, the peace did not last long. She turned her attention to her room door as it opened and Shego stepped out.

"Why don't you just knock on the front door?" Trin inquired.

"That's not fun," Shego answered with a shrug. She would have thought that was obvious.

"It's less troublesome, but I shouldn't expect you to do the less troublesome thing," the blonde remarked as Shego approached her and she noticed the villainess' expression.

Shego did not look like she usually did. Her face was tense, her body language tight, and the look in her eyes sullen while serious. Trin had never seen her in such a state. She was not sure what to make of it.

Things only got stranger as Shego sat on the far end of the sofa instead of pouncing on Trin like a crazed maniac. The raven-haired woman sighed and stared mostly at the floor. Trin could guess what was coming; she was sort of an expert on the matter.

"You're going to break up with me," Trin commented, making sure to keep her usual tone of voice.

"What?" Shego asked in disbelief. Could the blonde read minds?

"I've had it happen to me in every relationship I've ever had, not that this was a relationship, right?" Trin pointed out. It made things easier to say that they did not have a relationship; it was easier on both of them.

"That's true, but it was something and I think most of what it was could continue on, but not what we usually do when I show up here," the thief said. She actually hoped that things could continue for the most part.

Trin nodded. She liked that idea. She had never actually remained friends with girlfriends once they broke up with her, but that was because they did not totally interest her. Shego did interest her, though. They had something slightly unique; it would be completely unique if only Shego did not remind her so much of Shin. Maybe because Shego did remind her of Shin was why she would not mind being friends, or whatever they were going to be, and it was also why she could accept the breakup.

"Might I ask why you're breaking up with me?" Trin inquired.

"Well…this is going to sound very, very bad, but good thing I'm the bad guy around here," Shego remarked, smirking a bit just to seem normal.

"I don't think you want to measure rap sheets around here," the blonde commented.

"That's true."

"So, do I get my reason?" Trin asked. She was trying her best not to press the issue or make it seem like a big thing, but she really did want to know. After all, she liked being around Shego and she thought that the villainess liked being around her too.

"I might possibly be in love with your sister," Shego confessed. She tried her best not to look away, but she failed in the end, glancing at the wooden floor.

Trin had been expecting a lot of answers, but not that one and it showed on her face. She took a calming breath, closed her book, and took her glasses off. It was like she was preparing to battle, Shego noted. Trin just rubbed her eyes and placed her glasses back onto her face.

"What the hell have you been doing with my little sister?" Trin demanded to know, losing her cool demeanor for the first time since Shego had met her outside of a fight.

"Calm down, I didn't do anything with her. She hasn't told you about a recent mission of hers?" the green-skinned female asked, even though she knew that Kim did not report her missions to Trin.

"No. What happened?"

"There was a little mishap in Drakken's lair. Long story short, Kim was trapped under some snow and I saved her, which was when I realized that I cared about her," Shego somewhat explained.

Trin was silent for a moment. "Does my sister care for you in return?" Her voice was smaller than usual. She did not know what else to say and it seemed like an important question to ask.

"I don't know yet. I haven't even told her. I figured I'd tell you first and see if I was going to have to kill you before I got to Kim," the thief remarked.

Trin was quiet again. She had lost Shego to Kim? Wow, her pride was stinging quite considerably. She took a deep breath and told herself that she could be a big person about things. She could and would take things in an acceptable fashion.

"Shego, take care of Mini-me," Trin said in a strong tone, indicating that she was actually forcing it. If she truly meant it, she would have sounded like she always did, indifferent and bored.

"Well, I have to tell her first. Thanks for being so understanding about this, blondie," Shego said. She had a feeling that things would go as they were since Trin had to always at least appear in control and most of the time, she wanted to be in control in someway. She got that control by maintaining her own composure.

"It's all right. I mean, it's not changing much about us…except the part I don't like much anyway," Trin replied. She was lying a bit. She did not mind kissing Shego or the occasional grope from the older female, but she did take comfort in knowing that nothing else would change now that they had "broken up." She could live with that.

"You know you like it," Shego teased. "Well, I guess I'm going to go tell Kimmie how I feel about her."

"You do know she's pretty straight," Trin pointed out.

"And you hate being touched. What the hell do these things have to do with me?" the villainess remarked.

"You're also probably going to have to change. Kim isn't going to accept some ambiguous relationship with you. I wouldn't let her do something like that anyway," Trin commented.

"I know. Look, Drakken's been screwing up left and right lately. If he keeps going, he might end up killing himself, me, Kim, and everyone else around, which I'm not in favor of."

"Especially that whole 'killing you' part, huh?"

"Damn right, so I might be ready to settle down…somewhat. I mean, I'd still have you to kick around, which would be fun," Shego quipped with a smile.

"That's good, but I think I'll be kicking you around. If anything, I'll introduce you to Shin and maybe you could kick him around," the college student remarked.

"Okay, well, I'm going to get going before he gets back. I've got some work ahead of me, after all," Shego pointed out.

Trin nodded because Shego did have some work ahead of her, especially if Kim was straight. The raven-haired woman left the same way that she came in and Trin was again alone. It was just her and the fact that she had been left for her little sister. She hoped that Shego took care of Kim, although she had no doubt that the green-skinned woman would do just that. After all, Shego would not talk about changing and everything if she was not serious because Shego was typically proud of what she did.

-------------------

Trin was taken from her sleep by Shin crawling into her bed. She turned to him to look at him like the mad man she knew he was. He had the nerve to be settling into the pillow. She had to glance at his body to make sure the jerk was not in his street clothes while he was in her bed. No, he was in his pajamas, which meant that he was not so drunk he did not know where his room was.

"Shin, what time is it?" Trin inquired. It was a leading question.

"Six," he answered, his eyes closed as if he planned to go to sleep where he was.

"Why in the hell did you wake me up at six in the morning?" she demanded to know.

"Because I need to tell you something," he replied.

"And this couldn't wait until breakfast?"

"Nope."

"Well, tell me and then go get in your own bed," she commanded.

"I can't. I need you to wash my pillows."

"Shin, you did not throw up on your bed. Tell me that, please," she begged.

"Fine, I won't tell you, but you need to wash my pillows."

"You are a nasty ass. Fine, go to sleep, don't molest me, and tell me the news over breakfast," she said. She did not feel like dealing with him at the moment considering the day that she just had.

"I won't molest you. I'm pretty sure I'm gay," he informed her.

"Good for you, now go to sleep," she ordered. She noted that she was getting way too much news for one day.

"I'm going to tell my girlfriend in person…" he trailed off, letting Trin know that he had fallen asleep in mid-sentence. He was worn out thanks to a night on the town.

Trin sighed and hoped to the high heavens that Shin did not throw up on her bedspread like he did his own. She had always had a feeling about Shin being homosexual. He thought about it way too and seemed to just be trying to ignore it with a series of meaningless girlfriends. She was a bit surprised that he had ignored it, though. Shin was usually all for finding out things about himself, especially things that would set him apart from the mainstream and something that would bother people. She could already see him trying to make up for lost time because that was the kind of guy he was.

----(New day)

Tatsu grabbed her keys along with her resolve and headed out the door of her tiny home. She was going to see Shin, unannounced of all things. She knew that there was a chance of him not being there, but she would wait. She had to tell him face to face because she thought that he deserved that much.

So, she drove the few hours to his apartment. She knew where he lived, even though she had never been. She actually knew a lot about Shin, but that did not mean that they were a good couple. It just meant that he liked to talk, mostly about himself since she hardly ever added in and he was rather conceited.

Upon arrival, Tatsu was greeted at the door by a blonde woman. She knew that Shin lived with a woman that he affectionately called a "harpy," a "shrew," and "his evil twin" among other names. He also stated many times that she was a lesbian, as if to ease any fears that Tatsu might have about him living with a female. It still bothered her a bit, so he also pointed out that she was like a sister to him, but that did not help matters since Trin was not actually his sister.

"Hello, can I do something for you?" Trin asked in an almost professional tone.

"Hi…um…I'm Tatsu…Shin's girlfriend. I was hoping to see him," Tatsu explained.

"Oh, all right. He's not here right now and I'm not totally sure when he'll get back, but he should be sometime tonight. You can wait for him inside," Trin said and she motioned for the mechanic to enter her home.

Tatsu nodded and entered the apartment. Trin shut the door behind Tatsu while thinking that the blue-eyed female was the last girl that she thought Shin would date. Shin typically picked up wild girls, in order to bug out with them more often than not. Tatsu seemed rather reserved, even in the black jumpsuit. She looked like the mechanic she was with her clothing, but there was something about her mannerisms that just said she was far from the wild girl Shin typically was with.

Tatsu went into the living room and looked around. She was surprised that Shin would live some place so nice. The wooden floor was polished and clean; everything was in order. Shin was chaotic, not organized, so she guessed that his evil twin was the one that kept the place looking so presentable.

"Well, Tatsu, my name is Trin. I'm Shin's better half. Would you like anything while you wait?" Trin inquired.

Tatsu shook her head, declining the offer. Trin shrugged and sat down on the couch with a book, as she usually did when Shin went out. Tatsu sat down in an armchair and immediately noted how comfortable it was. They were silent for a while, which they both liked. Trin then got up and Tatsu watched her go to the kitchen.

"Would you like some tea or hot chocolate?" Trin offered and Tatsu shook her head as an answer. "Are you sure? I'm going to make some anyway."

"Um…okay…" Tatsu answered.

"Well, which do you want?" Trin inquired. Tatsu seemed almost bashful, which she thought was utterly adorable for some reason that was beyond her. Maybe it was because Tatsu did not seem like the type to be shy.

"It doesn't matter," Tatsu muttered.

Trin shrugged and she went to make herself some tea. She made Tatsu some hot chocolate because she thought that mechanic might enjoy it. Usually, she would not care about something that someone else enjoyed, but it was Shin's girlfriend and she was used to being hospitable on the rare occasions when she was playing host to someone…unless that someone was Shego anyway. Hey, her parents had taught her some manners and it was nice to use them every now and then.

She returned to the living room a few minutes later with two mugs in her hands, one crowned with a thick swirl of whipped cream. She put them both down on the coffee table, on top of coasters of course. She went back into the kitchen and came back with a plate of cookies, enough for two people.

"Enjoy," Trin said to Tatsu.

Tatsu nodded and waited to see which cup Trin was going to take. Trin took her cup of tea and a cookie. Tatsu then took the hot chocolate and sipped it to see just how hot it was. She found it to be a suitable temperature for drinking and then she decided to have a cookie. She was not sure what kind of cookie it was, but she was willing to try it.

"This is good…" Tatsu mumbled, more to herself than Trin.

"They're shortbread cookies," Trin said, which was her favorite type of cookie.

"They're really good and so's the hot chocolate. Thank you," the mechanic replied.

Trin nodded, but did not say anything more. They sat there silently for a little while longer until Trin asked Tatsu if she would like anything for dinner. Trin was going to call out for something to eat because she did not feel like cooking. Tatsu tried to decline, thinking that she had already been enough of a pest, but Trin was not looking to hear any of that while she was in her friendly-mode and told Tatsu the menu of the restaurant that she was ordering from. Tatsu sighed and gave in, requesting anything with baked chicken and rice.

Over the meal, the pair got to talking because Tatsu really liked the food and was curious about the restaurant. She wanted to know if there was one in Middleton, which there was. Trin gave up all of the information, but they continued on talking after that. They lost track of time and were surprised when Shin finally did come in.

"Whoa, Tatsu," Shin said in surprise when he caught sight of his girlfriend.

"Hey," Tatsu replied while slowly turning her attention from Trin to Shin.

"You must read minds just like me and my shrew. I was going to come see you tomorrow," Shin explained as he walked into the living room.

Tatsu shrugged. "Saved you the trip."

"I wish you didn't. I know you hate driving," he pointed out. Yes, he had some manners too and used them on occasion.

"I'm glad I did. It's shocking that you ever make it to Middleton with the way you drive," Tatsu muttered.

"Touché," Shin conceded with a laugh while noticing that his evil twin was easing out of the room. He went and sat down where Trin had been sitting while Tatsu watched the blonde exit the room.

"Shin, we need to talk," Tatsu said.

Shin sighed. "Yeah, we do. Let me go first since I usually do most of the talking anyway. Tatsu, you're a cool person. In fact, you're actually my favorite girlfriend, even though you never want to go out with me unless it's to some races. But, there's something just cool about you. So, I'm not doing this because I don't like you. I do, but I need to break up with you," he stated. It would have surprised Trin to hear him speak in such a gentle manner, even though he was still being his usual blunt self.

"That's cool. I was going to break up with you too," Tatsu replied.

"Yeah? Can I ask why?" Shin inquired since he was not accustomed to girls breaking things off with him.

"I've been cheating on you," she answered as if it was nothing.

"Yeah, I thought as much. For a long time?" he asked curiously.

"Some months."

"That makes sense. I don't hold it against you. I mean, I don't live in the same town as you and I hardly come visit you and when I do, I want to go out and do things you hate. I hope the other guy is better to you than that."

Tatsu shrugged for lack of a better thing to do. Kim actually was much better than Shin, but she was going to have to let Kim go too. At least her conscience would leave her alone, even though she would be all alone when everything was said and done.

"How come you're breaking up with me?" Tatsu inquired curiously. She wondered if he had something going on with the rather friendly, curvy blonde that he lived with. She could see why he would leave her for Trin.

"Well, turns out that me and that harpy that just left have way more in common than we thought. I've finally figured out that I'm gay," he declared quite proudly.

"How long have you been trying to figure that out?" she asked. She could not be mad at him for that since she had been carrying on with Kim.

"Hmm…good question. It might have been ever since I hit puberty. I don't know. So, can we still hang out?"

"For races," she answered.

"I figured as much. One day, I'm going to figure out how to drag you to a club. I mean, if I can get that damned harpy to go out every now and then, I can get anybody to do it. Hey, since we're still cool for the most part, you should stay here for the night and get a fresh start for Middleton in the morning. Trust me, the pancakes that the shrew makes alone will be enough for you to be happy you stayed," Shin said.

"Um…"

"No, don't argue. I'll get you a pillow and cover and you can sleep on the sofa," he said. He would never occur to him to offer his bed to his guest.

Tatsu opened her mouth to protest, but Shin strolled off before she had the chance. He went into Trin's room and snatched the pillow that she leaning against, causing her to fall back and then he started grabbing her comforter. She was so incredulous to his behavior that she was speechless for almost a half-a-minute.

"What the hell are you doing?" Trin inquired.

"Got to make our guest comfortable," Shin answered, as if that was obvious.

"What do you mean?"

"Tatsu's going to stay the night. Cool?"

"Oh…" Trin thought on it for a moment. She did not see anything wrong with that, but she did not understand why he needed her things. "Okay, but why are you taking my pillow and blanket?"

"She's camping out on the sofa."

"Why? Why doesn't she sleep in your bed?"

"Because I'm sleeping there."

"So what? She's your girlfriend," Trin pointed out.

"Not anymore. We just mutually broke up with each other. Apparently, she was cheating on me and I'm gay," Shin informed his best friend.

Trin did not even know what to say and decided against trying. She conceded the pillow and blanket to him, if only to get rid of him that very moment. She lay down and went to sleep herself.

-------------------

Next time: the end, so everything should be in order by then.


	7. Connections

I don't own these characters, except for Trin, Shin, and Tatsu. The rest belong to Disney.

7: Connections

Shego decided on writing Kim some emails, having gotten the address from Kim's website. She had gone with that because it was easier than trying to go talk to Kim, who would probably just assume that she had shown up for a fight, even though she had saved Kim's life not too long ago. Kim had freaked when she woke up after that snow incident, but she calmed down eventually and they left the cabin on their usual terms.

She was also pretty certain that Kim opened all of her emails in case it was an emergency of some kind; with Kim being as active as she was, an emergency could be just about anything anywhere. So, she felt it was safe to send the emails. She just had to hope that Kim did not delete any later ones once she figured out who it was that contacting her.

The green-skinned woman was incredulous to what she was doing at first, but every time she had that feeling, she remembered pulling Kim's almost blue body out of the snow and spooning the girl to warm her up. She had never felt such emotion in her life, except for when she and her brothers had been hit by that comet; she had been the first one to regain consciousness when that happened and she swore that her brothers had died. Yeah, they annoyed her, but they were still her brothers and to think that they were dead for the longest minute in her life was the worst feeling that she had ever had.

She felt some confidence in her cause as she wrote things to the hero because she figured that Kim would talk things out with Trin. With luck, Trin would at least endorse her while, of course, making sure Kim knew better than to take any b.s from her. Even though she had broken off whatever they had together, she was pretty sure that Trin would inform Kim that it was safe to give her a chance.

"I guess meeting that crazy blonde might actually work out in my favor," Shego muttered. It was hard to believe that too, but she did.

-------------------

Tatsu could not believe the breakfast that Trin prepared, but it seemed like Shin expected no less. He was actually complaining about the food and Trin was threatening him with all kinds of things. Tatsu sat quietly, watching the two go back and forth and she almost could not believe they were not a couple.

"Shin, do you want me to give you some unnecessary surgery?" Trin inquired while holding up a carving knife.

"I dunno, do you want to find your glasses unnecessary?" he countered, holding up a pair of needle shuriken, implying that he would use those to blind her and she would no longer require glasses.

It was those interactions that allowed Tatsu to see that the pair really were more like extremely insane siblings. She finished the breakfast that had been laid out before her, which had been light, fluffy pancakes, scrambled eggs with cheese (Shin's favorite way to have eggs), sausage, and a small bowl of assorted fruits on the side. She wished that she could eat like that every morning.

"Um…thanks for everything," Tatsu said as she got up from the table and was about to leave.

"No problem," Trin replied.

The mechanic was very grateful for everything, but really did not have the vocabulary at the moment to express that. She had a feeling that it was not really necessary, even though she would have liked to express it. She just quietly left the apartment with Trin showing her to the door. Trin went to finish her food and eyed Shin curiously.

"What do you want, beast-girl?" Shin inquired since he could tell that there was something on her mind. He did focus mostly on his meal rather than on her, though; he was on his third helping of everything.

"Would it bother you at all if I were to ask Tatsu out?" Trin asked.

Shin dropped his fork; he was clearly surprised by that question. It was just that Trin did not typically ask girls out. She led them on and waited for them to make that leap, just like she waited for them to break up with her. She was weird in that regard as far as he was concerned.

He started to consider the possibilities of her going out with Tatsu and he doubted that it would work out. His evil twin and Tatsu did not have anything in common, not anything whatsoever in his opinion. He decided against saying something like that and just went with pointing out the obvious.

"Tatsu's straight as far as I know," Shin answered.

"As far as you knew, you were straight less than forty-eight hours ago," the blonde remarked.

"Hey, it was more than forty-eight hours, okay," he defended himself.

"I don't care if it was forty-eight seconds ago. Would it bother you if I asked her out?" Trin asked again.

"I think she's in a relationship," Shin commented.

"That doesn't answer my question."

He knew it did not answer her question, but he always had a good time being evasive, especially with her. He did think on her question. It actually would not bother him at all if she went out with Tatsu, if that were possible anyway. Trin was a good girlfriend, after all, except for her dislike for touching. He supposed that he would not care since Tatsu would have a caring mate for a while and then she would undoubtedly eventually break up with Trin for the same reason that all girls did. And then, he and Trin's lives would go on as usual.

"It wouldn't bother me anymore than on those rare occasions that you have a girlfriend, which reminds me, don't you have a girlfriend?" the half-Japanese male inquired.

"She broke up with me," Trin reported in a dull voice. Her pride was still smarting over the fact that Shego had broken things off with her as far as their inside play went, but she supposed that she was happy for her sister. She had gotten to know Shego fairly well over the months that they had come spend time with each other.

Shego was not the type to pour her heart out over something, so it was big for her to just admit that she probably loved Kim. She was also a person that liked what she liked and she did what she liked, which included pestering Trin with physical attention. For her to suggest that they stop before she even knew how Kim was going to respond to her affections was tremendous because it was something that could blow up in her face and she would not have anything to fall back on. As far as her personal life went, Shego did not like working without a net, but she was doing that now.

"Hey, why do you want to go out with Tatsu anyway?" Shin inquired curiously.

"Well, we had a really nice talk last night," Trin answered. She had enjoyed Tatsu's company and that was a strange thing for her. She would like to see if it meant something or if it was just a hiccup in life.

"You do know she's a mechanic right? Not up to your usual standards. She dresses like that all time, she doesn't know any chemicals, and doesn't act all intellectual and whatnot," he pointed out.

"If you don't want me to ask her, I won't."

"I didn't say that. I just don't think she's your type, but hey, go for it," the young man declared, not knowing what he might be starting obviously.

Trin nodded; she was going to go for it. They had the last of their finals in a couple of days and then they were going to go home for the summer. She was going to get to see Kim graduate high school in a couple of months too, which would be great. And maybe, she would have a girlfriend for a little while; she never expected to have a girlfriend for more than a couple of months and often, she doubted that she would want one for longer than that.

-------------------

Tatsu got home and guessed that it was time to release Kim too. She was going to miss the spirited redhead, but she had to do what she had to do. She hoped that things went as well with Kim as they did with Shin, although she doubted it. After all, Kim was already gay, so that one was not going to come up.

She sighed and she called Kim to see if she could come over. Kim was the only person that she ever called for recreational purposes; everyone else got calls in regards to their cars or things like that. She guessed that it was going to be her last phone call that did not involve business. It was actually saddening.

Kim arrived, smiling bright as the sun as usual. She gave Tatsu an enthusiastic hug and a peck on the mouth as a greeting. Tatsu felt like such an ass as she accepted those things. How could she hurt someone that cared so much about her? The mechanic felt beyond awful and it was visible on her face, which was rare.

"Hey, sweetie, what's wrong?" Kim asked because of the downtrodden look in Tatsu's entrancing ice blue eyes.

"I have to tell you something," Tatsu muttered while putting her head down and rubbing her forehead with the heel of her palm as if it would help her feel better, but it was not doing such a thing.

"What? What's wrong?" Kim asked again, placing her hand on Tatsu's shoulder for support.

"Kim, you're just about the only person I ever met in life that I like being around for a long time. I wish I did this right and that way I wouldn't feel so screwed up…"

"What? What did you do?" the redhead inquired in a gentle tone.

"All the time we've been going out, I had a boyfriend…" Tatsu admitted.

"What?" Kim gasped and backed away just a bit because of the shock.

"He didn't come around often. He lives in another city. We broke up last night. I wish that could be it. I wish it was so easy…" the mechanic mumbled more so than usual, but the hero understood her words.

"What do you mean?"

"I need to let you go too, Kim. It's only right. You deserve someone so much better than me. I wasn't honest with you or anything about this, so this has to be it."

"You make it sound so simple…" Kim whispered, looking absolutely destroyed in her olive eyes, which crushed Tatsu.

The mechanic nervously played with her hands. She felt like such a worthless wretch, unworthy of any company that she might enjoy. She then suddenly began hitting herself in the head with her palm; it was an old habit from childhood when she did something so obviously stupid that even she recognized it for what it was.

"It's my fault. I'm sorry. I'm so stupid…" Tatsu mumbled so badly that Kim did not understand her at all.

"Stop it," Kim begged. She wanted the mechanic to stop hitting herself so hard, but Tatsu just continued on.

"Stupid, stupid, stupid," the raven-haired female muttered. Everyone was right about her. She was just so stupid. That was why she could not make it through high school, that was why her parents had never paid her much mind, and that was why she was going to lose Kim.

"Tatsu," Kim said, grabbing Tatsu's hand to get her to stop. She held the offensive hand to make sure that Tatsu did not abuse herself anymore.

"I'm so sorry I did this to us," Tatsu apologized, sounding almost like she was going to cry.

"It's okay. We could work through it," Kim offered. She probably said that more for how distressed the older female was than the fact that she believed that they could survive as a couple after Tatsu confessed to two-timing, but she was not totally sure.

"No, we can't. You shouldn't trust me anymore. If I could do something like this to someone I like, what kind of person does that make me? I want you to be with someone better than me," Tatsu replied.

"Tatsu…" Kim was not sure what to say. She liked to think that they could work through it all, but maybe Tatsu had a point. After all, Tatsu had been cheating on her and even though she seemed all choked up and sincere now, she might go out and do it again. Maybe they did need to just call it quits now, but she would hate to leave Tatsu feeling so horrible.

The now ex-couple took a few minutes trying to make each other feel better. It was awkward for both of them. Tatsu did not think that she was worth the time for Kim to even try to cheer her up. Kim would like to leave as soon as she could because she was hurt by the breakup.

Once Kim left, Tatsu just went to work. She just figured that she would do the only thing that brought her joy now, fixing vehicles. It would be able to keep her out of trouble and keep her from hurting anyone else, which was fine by her.

----(New day)

Kim was eager for the day to end. Her sister was coming home and she had a lot of things that she needed to talk about, most of those things having to do with emails that she kept getting from a certain green-skinned villainess. She did not know what to do, especially since having her heart broken recently. She hoped that Trin had some answers for her. But, she was going to have to wait until the blonde showed up.

Trin had made a detour when she got into Middleton. She had come alone; Shin wanted to do some end-of-school partying with some new associates, so he was going to come along in a week or so…or so he claimed. She went to visit Tatsu, finding the mechanic elbow deep in the hood of a car.

"Excuse me," Trin called in while knocking on the side door that was open to let some air in.

Tatsu turned to see who was there. "You…" she said in a surprised tone when she caught sight of the blonde female.

"Hello again. Quite the space you have here," Trin commented as she looked around. There were three cars parked in the garage area with a work bench up against a wall.

Tatsu did not respond, thinking that Trin was making fun of her, which she really did not need at the moment. She still felt terrible from her breakup with Kim. She did not want company of any kind, especially if that company was going to try to belittle her.

Trin took note of the cold shoulder that she was receiving, but pressed on. She really would like to go out with Tatsu and continue to be in her presence. They had gotten along quite well for the short time that they had been together. She would like to see if that was just a fluke.

"I was wondering if you're not busy tonight, perhaps you'd like to join me for dinner? I know quite the nice restaurant," the blonde commented. She knew a good restaurant that she thought the mechanic would like since she had enjoyed the dinner that they had in the apartment. It was also a place that she would not be stared at or bothered by local Middleton assholes.

"So?" Tatsu replied, practically biting Trin's head off with that one word.

"I thought you would enjoy it," the farsighted female continued.

"I wouldn't," Tatsu replied.

"Are you sure?"

"Could you just leave?" the mechanic huffed.

Trin frowned at being ordered around, but she did not have time to screw around. She planned to pick up Kim from school, so she turned and left. But, things were not done by far in her opinion. Minutes after she left, Tatsu's phone went off and she answered without looking at it.

"What?" Tatsu snorted the question out.

"Man, you sound pissy. Did the harpy make it to you yet?" Shin inquired.

"Harpy?"

"Trin," he clarified. He was calling because he had to know what happened and he knew that Trin would not tell him without him being able to pester her in person, which he would only be able to do in about a week.

"Oh…yeah."

"Cool. So, did you accept her offer or did you bust her little pink bubble by telling her you're straight and with a dude?"

"Huh?"

"She asked you out, right?" he asked.

"Oh…yeah."

"Did you accept or what?" he inquired.

"No…" she answered.

"Why not? Because of the other boyfriend?"

"I'm single now," she found herself telling him. "I didn't accept."

"What? And you're single? Is it because you're straight then?"

"No…" she answered.

"Well, then why?"

"I just don't want to be bothered now," Tatsu informed him.

"Look, Tatsu, I don't know what happened with you and not wanting to be bothered, but if you're single and not against going out with women, you really should take the harpy up on her offer. Trust me, she doesn't usually offer, but when she does, you really need to take her up on it. She likes you and you'd like her company, plus she pays for everything," he remarked.

"I don't know…" she replied hesitantly.

"Trust me, if you two got along while you were here, you'll like going out with her. So, you really should give it a try. I bet it'll clear up your pissy attitude. Just think about it for a while and then call her up and tell her you changed your mind. With luck, the offer is still out there," he quipped, which was not making her feel much better.

"I don't have her number," she pointed out.

"I'll give it to you," he declared proudly. He felt like he was helping and that made him feel good; well, helping when it came to people he was close to. He was not a fan of helping in general. He thought that if nothing else, going out with Trin would get Tatsu out of whatever funk she was in and Trin would have a girlfriend to shower her odd affections on for the summer. Come fall term, everything would go back to normal, though; well, that was what he thought anyway.

-------------------

Kim was glad to see Trin and she was ready to confess something rather heavy to her older sister. She was so confused that she needed to tell someone and so, she told Trin because they told each other everything. She explained as quickly as possible that her arch-foe's sidekick was trying to woo her through the internet it seemed and the weird thing was that she thought it was working. Trin sighed as she read the emails; Shego was obviously no romantic, but at least she was getting her point across. The tone of the messages did convey that Shego felt deeply for Kim.

"Well, Mini-me, it would seem the ball is in your court. Now, are you or are you not interested in exploring her feelings with her?" Trin inquired.

"I don't know…" Kim replied in an unsure tone. She had been thinking about Shego a lot thanks to the emails and she had also been thinking about how Shego saved her life. It meant a lot to her, she realized.

"Well, until you know, this is going to be quite the dull conversation," Trin pointed out.

"Do you think I should?"

"Don't you like taking chances?" the blonde countered.

"But, she's a criminal."

"She's conveyed willingness to change for you, so that's not the best argument. If she's willing to try, shouldn't you have faith?" Trin asked.

"What if she's lying?" Kim countered.

"Well, she's invested a lot of time and effort into this lie. Even if it might be, you've expressed an interest. Are you going to let that go?"

"But, if it's a trick, she could go around saying…things about me," Kim said.

"People say things all the time, whether they're true or not."

"Trin…would you care if I was…um….a…" Kim could not get the question out. It was one of the things that kept her from moving forward with the decision on her current situation. What would her sister say about her now that she had shown her so much?

"Mini-me, between the two of us, I understand exactly where you're coming from," the elder female replied.

Kim could hardly believe those implications. "You're a…"

"I am. And in my professional opinion, I think that you should give this a try. If it is a trick, you know that Shin and I have your back and we would all make her pay dearly for such a thing," Trin remarked.

"I don't like you hurting people," Kim reminded Trin.

"Well, I don't like people hurting you," Trin riposted.

The redhead sighed. "So, you think I should try?"

"I do. While there is a chance that it is a trick, there's also a chance that she's being sincere. What if she's being sincere?"

Kim nodded to show that she understood. Trin left Kim to think of what they talked about. As soon as the blonde got into her bedroom, her phone went off. She checked to see how was calling and did not recognize the phone number. She answered anyway and it turned out to be Tatsu. It would seem the mechanic had changed her mind, which Trin accepted, even though she had been upset with being brushed off before.

Tatsu did take the time to explain that she had been having a bad few days and she did not mean to take it out on Trin. The college student accepted that and then explained that she might have a situation of her own soon, so she would like to move their date to next week. Tatsu accepted that because it would give her time to get her head together.

Trin was right to postpone her date because once Kim decided that she would like to see Shego was being serious, she had to start plotting for that to be possible. She called Shin and they came up with an idea to "rescue" Shego from not only Drakken's madness, but from the arms of any systems of justice that might be looking to take her down. Trin and Shin sighed; the things they did for Kim.

----(New day)

After a trying time of getting Global Justice to plea bargain away any time in jail that Shego would have had to serve by getting Shego to tell a few secrets of Drakken's, everyone got a chance to take a breather. The so-called bargain for Shego to end up with probation for a few years was actually stacked in GJ's favor as far as Trin was concerned because come her next break from school, she was going to have to work for the bloody organization doing computer work and maybe even a few missions. She was irked, but she was fine with doing it because so far Kim seemed very happy with Shego. In fact, they were living together in the apartment down the hall. Kim was going to the same school as Trin and Shin.

Trin herself was now blissfully dating Tatsu and making a better effort than Shin ever did to maintain the long distance relationship between the two of them, which Tatsu seemed to truly appreciate. Tatsu was definitely glad that Shin talked her into taking that date with Trin a few months ago because Trin certainly did make her happy.

Shin was making up for lost time, as Trin suspected he would, when it came to his sexuality. He was wilder than ever now that he found out he was gay. A couple of times, she had walked in on him with a random male, much to her disgust; that never happened when he was going out with girls. She hated that he would do such things on her good furniture and her polished floors, but he seemed to love every second that he was able to get on her nerves and have a good time.

The one thing that Shin was starting to notice was that his harpy seemed to be falling away from him. Slowly but surely, things with her were drifting more toward Tatsu. It was a bit upsetting for him since he was used to Trin being his and he sometimes threw fits about it, but she did not care. Eventually, he figured it out; his nutty shrew had fallen in love.

"Oh, great," Shin muttered to himself one day while watching Trin preparing for her six-month anniversary with Tatsu, making it by far the longest relationship that she had ever been in. "I just pretty much gave her away," he said to himself. He had pretty much put Tatsu into Trin's lap, which bothered him at the moment. She was supposed to be his evil twin, _his_.

He was quarantined in his room that night for Tatsu's first visit to the apartment since she and Trin had become a couple. Trin would have liked for him to just go out, but he wanted some of the hot, delicious chicken dinner that she was making. So, they struck the deal that he could have some, as long as he stayed in his room for the entire night once Tatsu showed up. The morning was a different matter altogether, even though Tatsu was still there that morning.

"Hey, can we get some breakfast?" Shego shouted as she and Kim entered the apartment in the morning.

"Shego, if you picked that lock to get in, you know the harpy is going to eat you alive like the bird demon she is," Shin remarked from the dining room table.

"Damn right I am," Trin concurred from the kitchen.

Shego rolled her eyes. She and Trin got along pretty well when they interacted outside of sparring; much like Trin and Shin got along, though. They exchanged insults and smart remarks. Trin nagged Shego on perceived bad habits, like she did with Shin, and Shego shot back with snide comments. It was just like they used to be actually, without kissing and groping of the past.

"I used my key, sis," Kim said to quell any fight that might arise because Trin seriously hated when Shego picked the door lock for the hell of it.

Trin did not respond and Kim and Shego walked over to the dining area. Kim looked into the kitchen and saw something decidedly weird, Tatsu. Tatsu was in the kitchen with Trin, just hovering around the blonde. She noticed Kim and they both just started at each other. The world could not be that small, they considered.

Kim's reaction and Tatsu's reaction to seeing each other did not go unnoticed. They were asked about it by their significant others in private. Both Kim and Tatsu explained what happened; Tatsu having to include that she had been having an affair with Kim because she had been with Shin at the time. Kim had little fear while Tatsu was scared out of her mind that Trin was going to leave her.

Trin took in the information, keeping her usual calm demeanor about her, which did not make her girlfriend feel at ease. Tatsu had been in a relationship with her sister? It was not as big a deal as Tatsu really thought. After knowing that Tatsu was in a relationship with Shin, who was like a brother to her, so her being with a sibling was not so odd. There were other implications, though.

"You're not with me because I remind you of Kim, are you?" Trin asked curiously, her heart in her throat while waiting for an answer. She was actually scared. She was frightened to know that she might have fallen in love with a woman that just wanted her because she could not have Kim.

"No!" Tatsu objected with surprising force. "No, nothing like that. Hell, I didn't even know she was your sister until today. When I told you I love you last night, I meant it. I do love you. I liked being with Kim because she was the first person that tried to understand me and be nice to me, but I love you."

Trin did not respond or move, but Tatsu did. The mechanic grabbed Trin into a tight hug and held onto her. Oh, god, she did not want to lose Trin. She honest and truly loved the blonde.

"Please," Tatsu whispered. "Believe me like you did last night," she begged with sorrow in her voice.

Trin could only nod. She did believe Tatsu because of how desperate the embrace felt and because of the conviction in her voice. So, she returned the hug, even though she still had a problem with hugging, which made the embrace even more special because Tatsu was aware of how Trin felt about hugging.

"Just to let you know though, if you cheat on me…" Trin did not even finish the thought.

"Don't worry, I'd never do something like that again, especially not to you. I love you and I never want to lose you," Tatsu replied and she pushed herself up to kiss Trin on the lips; the blonde was taller than Tatsu. Trin returned the show of affection; she believed that Tatsu would remain faithful to her. Life was about taking chances anyway, she told herself.

-------------------

Shego was going through something similar. She had felt the need to be honest after Kim confessed that she had a relationship with Tatsu. Shego had actually came out and said that she had "a thing" with Trin. She hesitated in calling it a relationship because she and Trin had not really considered it such. In all honesty, she had no clue what to consider what she had with Trin aside for "a thing."

"Whoa, are you with me because I remind you of Trin then?" Kim inquired.

"First of all, Princess, you don't remind me of Trin at all, aside for the nagging anyway. You guys are like apples and oranges to me. I stopped the thing that me and Trin had because I figured out that I love you. I do love you and that's that," Shego stated soundly.

"That's that?" Kim echoed in a bemused tone. Some of the things that the former villainess let leave her mouth baffled her. That just did not sound like the proper way to end the discussion that they were having.

"Yeah, that's that. I love you and I'm going to stick it out with you, so stop arguing with me and stop trying to pick a fight," the pale woman replied.

"I'm not trying to pick a fight," Kim argued.

"Then just take my word on it that I love you, just like I'm going to take your word on it that you're not doing anything with Tatsu. She's with Trin and you're with me and that's the end," Shego declared.

Kim decided to just trust Shego because the former thief did have a point. Tatsu was with Trin and according to Shin, the two were so in love that it made him want to disembowel himself to not have to see it anymore. She and Shego were together, also in love. And Shin was, well, himself. So, that was the end.

-------------------

The end.


End file.
